About “Lyle Muller Doesn’t Have a Fancy Column Title”
Lyle Muller is a retired newspaper and nonprofit news editor and reporter whose first book, “A Messy Church, An Iowa Church’s Journey Through United Methodist Celebrations,” was published in November 2025. He writes columns as part of the Iowa Writers’ Collaborative about things that concern him, notably when people in power affect people who are not in power, but also trends that should make people think, regardless of whether they do or do not actually do that thinking. His columns and stories have appeared in several publications that include The Gazette in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, The Des Moines Register and Reveal.
He was the non-profit Iowa Center for Public Affairs Journalism’s (IowaWatch) first full-time executive director-editor from May 2012 until retiring from that position in August 2019. Before that, he held several reporting and editing positions during 25 years at the Cedar Rapids Gazette in Iowa, among them being editor of the Iowa City Gazette in 1999-2003 and The Gazette in 2009-12, but also leading investigative and special projects, and serving as a senior editor with a team of editors that directed coverage of an Iowa flooding disaster, which won The Gazette the Society of Professional Journalists’ national Sigma Delta Chi award for deadline reporting in 2008.
A 1992 Council for the Advancement of Science Writing national fellow, his focus as a reporter was on health, science and higher education.
He remains active in journalism as the professional adviser for Grinnell College’s student-run The Scarlet & Black newspaper, a trustee of the Iowa Freedom of Information Council, and as a Board of Directors member of the Midwest Center for Investigative Reporting (Investigate Midwest) and Iowa High School Press Association. Grinnell College is a well-respected liberal arts college that does not have a journalism program, yet, The Scarlet & Black was named the Iowa College Media Association’s 2023, 2024 and 2025 News & Multimedia Organization of the Year because of its award-winning journalism.
Lyle attained a fantasy privilege when he hosted in June 2025 a “My Fab Four” segment for Sirius XM’s The Beatles channel. Yes, it was a passion project; he is a fan with an extensive library of Beatles music, books, and video.
His career also includes serving on Pulitzer Prize juries that selected finalists for investigative reporting for 2017 and commentary for 2018, being the first reporting coach for The Daily Iowan’s award-winning Ethics and Politics Initiative journalism project, being the Iowa editor for PolitiFact, and teaching political reporting and editing at the University of Iowa School of Journalism and Mass Communication as an adjunct faculty member. A University of Iowa graduate with a major in communication studies, he was a 2017 High School Association Stratton Award winner for distinguished service to scholastic journalism, 2023 recipient of the Iowa Newspaper Association’s Distinguished Service Award for outstanding contributions to the newspaper industry and 2025 recipient of the Iowa College Media Association’s Eighmey Award for outstanding contributions to college media.
The Iowa Writers Collaborative is a group of journalists and writers bringing you news and information on a regular basis. Learn more about the writers here.
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