Ken Thomson, media baron, Canada's richest man, dies

TORONTO, June 12 (Reuters) Canadian newspaper tycoon Ken Thomson, who helped transform his father's print empire into one of the world's biggest electronic publishers, has died. He was 82.

Thomson was Canada's richest man and the ninth wealthiest in the world, according to Forbes magazine. Thomson Corp. announced that the media baron had died in Toronto today morning.

Thomson, who kept a relatively low profile compared with many newspaper barons, took over the family holdings in 1976 on the death of his father, Roy Thomson. The company has since evolved into an international electronic information powerhouse with 2005 revenues of 8.7 billion dollars.

''We will miss his support and companionship terribly,'' David Thomson, Ken Thomson's eldest son and current Thomson Corp chairman, said in a statement. ''All of my grandfather's family are deeply grateful to my father for his wise stewardship of our family business for more than 30 years.'' ''More importantly, he was a gentle and kind man who impressed everyone with whom he came in contact. He was much loved.'' Thomson stepped down as chairman of Thomson in 2002, handing over the reins to David Thomson. At the time, he cited his age and a desire to ensure a smooth succession. David Thomson had previously worked at venerable retailer Hudson's Bay Co., in which the Thomsons held a stake until 1997.

The Thomson media empire, whose flagship Canadian newspaper is the Globe and Mail, was launched in 1930 by Roy Thomson when he obtained a franchise to sell radios in Northern Ontario. The elder Thomson, who would later become Lord Thomson of Fleet, then opened a local radio station, primarily to help boost sales.

In 1934, Roy Thomson bought his first newspaper, the weekly Timmins Press, also in Northern Ontario, for Canadian dollars 2,600 and turned it into a daily. Twenty-five years later, he acquired 15 British newspapers, including the Sunday Times, and then took the company public in 1965. Thomson continued his acquisition spree in Britain, buying the Times of London in 1967.

But in a move that would presage the eventual sale of much of the original source of the family's fortune, Ken Thomson sold the Times to Rupert Murdoch in 1981.

By 1996, Thomson Corp had begun moving out of the newspaper business and into other avenues such as legal publishing.

Seven years ago, in 1999, the company cemented that shift when it announced it would sell all but one of its newspaper assets to concentrate on electronic publishing. Thomson Corp hung on to the Globe and Mail, which Ken Thomson had referred to as ''the jewel in the crown'' of the company.

Thomson, an art lover and an avid collector of the 19th century Canadian landscape artist Cornelius Kreighoff, was said to be the complete opposite of his larger-than-life father.

Unlike his father, who reveled in his peerage and relinquished his Canadian citizenship so he could be appointed to Britain's House of Lords, Ken Thomson did not use his hereditary title in Canada.

The intensely private Thomson had often been described as a shy, shrewd businessman with an aloof nature.

''The chief distinguishing feature of Ken Thomson is that he doesn't have any chief distinguishing features,'' one observer said of him years ago.

Married with three children, Thomson was born in Toronto and raised in North Bay, Ontario. He served with the Royal Canadian Air Force during the Second World War and attended Cambridge University after the war.

REUTERS SY BD2117