Thomas Callahan

I am a writer and professional journalist. I have been one my entire life. I still am one, and expect I will always be a writer in some format or another.

My strength as a teacher comes from my real world experience.

For 20 years I was a contributor to THE NEW YORK TIMES, writing for Sunday business and the Westchester regional. For over a decade I was a writer for PARADE magazine, which at the time was the largest circulation publication in America with 76 million readers. For 16 years concurrently, I was contributing editor of a national men's magazine. As a freelance journalist, my work appeared in over 100 publications.

For a decade I contributed to READER'S DIGEST GENERAL BOOKS, writing for two books on American history.

I am a successful ghostwriter of books, have authored two memoirs (still unpublished) and a mystery novel. also unpublished as of yet, but it will be.

In April 2015, a short story of mine will be published in DARK CITY LIGHTS, a noir anthology editor by NEW YORK TIMES bestselling fiction author Lawrence Block.

That short story I am planning to turn into a novel or movie treatment.

I have reviewed books for the online publication, bookreporter.com, for over a decade. I have written about music for blurtonline, specifically the blues, a genre I have written about in many publications.

I have a national magazine profile being completed in March 2015, which will be published in June 2015.

Writers write.

I have done journalism, features, history, entertainment, all sorts of nonfiction.

My goal now is to write and publish mystery novels. My goal now is to write for movies and TV, where some of the best writiing is now being done.

I've met and exceeded every goal I ever set for myself since graduating as validictorian of my class from Manhattan College. I expect I will meet these current goals.

 

Courses Taught

Ethics in Communications

News Reporting and Writing

Introduction to Journalism

Feature Writing

Quad I, II, III

  • Research

    My passion is the vital link between journalism and democracy. I have witnessed firsthand how journalism has been adversely affected by corporations and media consolidation over the past two decades. My fear is that a radically shunken and weakened journalism means that American people are not getting the information they need to be informed citizens and their news, especially broadcast, is being dominated now by infotainment.

    So I have been following the work of Free Press since that organization started, and doing my own research along their lines. And advocating for Independent journalism and specifically net nuetrality.

     I am also a strong supporter of the work being done by Project Censored.

  • Professional Experience and Memberships

    1981-Present FREE-LANCE WRITER/REPORTER/AUTHOR

     

    *Doctrine of Injustice. 50,000 word ghost written book published in 2011 by the Jenkins Group and written for Keith R. Caldwell, Sr.

     

    *BOOKREPORTER.COM. Regular book reviewer and contributor to on-line publication with over one million circulation. Review both fiction and nonfiction books and conduct interviews with authors. 2002-present.

     

    * THE NEW YORK TIMES. Regular contributor to the Westchester Weekly. Reporter and feature writer covering Westchester County, NY, specializing in county government. Numerous front page stories. Also contributed business features and profiles to Sunday Financial section. Author of over 130 articles. 1983-2003.

     

    *PARADE MAGAZINE. Regular contributor of feature and human interest articles to the largest circulation publication in the U.S. with a readership of 71 million a week. Traveled US in search of stories about ordinary people doing extraordinary things to help others and their communities. 1989-2003.

     

    *LAW AND POLITICS, Minneapolis, Minnesota. Regular contributor to New York, Washington DC and Upstate New York editions of Super Lawyers Magazine. Interview and write profiles of criminal and civil lawyers, 2002-present.

     

    *BLUES REVUE. Contributing writer. Music journalist doing profiles and reviews of blues musicians and music. 2000-present.

     

    *READER'S DIGEST. Co-author of two non-fiction history books: "Strange Stories and Amazing Facts of America's Past"--published in 1989—and "Our Glorious Century"-- published in 1994. Wrote treatment for 1992 video "Events that Made American Great." Contributed to other books and wrote blurbs for DIGEST books. 1986-1995.

     

    *GALLERY MAGAZINE. Contributing editor. Investigative reporter, doing 65 full-length reports (2,000-4,000 words) on a wide range of topics from politics to business to music to sports. Also wrote numerous profiles, Q&As, features, music columns and short fiction. 1983-1999.

     

    *FORD FOUNDATION & ROCKEFELLER BROTHERS FOUNDATION. Wrote articles for the Ford Foundation magazine and covered conferences for the Rockefeller Brothers Foundation and then wrote internal reports about those conferences. 1998-2002.

     

    *IBM Corporation. Published CIO profiles for IBM's "Beyond Computing" magazine. Contributed to the publications of the National Accounts and Systems Products Division of IBM. Articles dealing with corporate education, product development, productivity. Also participated in writing and editorial workshops for IBM employees. 1985-1991.

     

    *THE TABLET. Won the 1986 Catholic Press Association Award for Best Feature Reporting for writing a series of ten articles and a booklet for THE TABLET, the newspaper of the Roman Catholic diocese of Brooklyn, New York. Series entitled "Inside the Parish."

     

    *GANNETT WESTCHESTER ROCKLAND NEWSPAPERS. Regular contributor to SUBURBIA TODAY, Sunday supplement. Investigative reporter, general assignment reporter and feature writer. 1981-1984.

             

  • Honors, Awards, and Grants

    *Nominated for the ROBERT F. KENNEDY Award 1997 for the article, “When I see people in need, I see a mirror of myself.” The article was published in PARADE MAGAZINE on May 26 1996.

    *CATHOLIC PRESS ASSOCIATION AWARD, 1986, BEST FEATURE REPORTING. This award was for a series of 10 articles later published in a book. The series was entitled “Inside the Parish.”

    *SOCIAL ISSUES RESOURCES SERIES, 1986. Selected my article "Old Age and Driving Don't Always Mix" to be distributed to high school and college libraries throughout the United States.

    *OUTSTANDING YOUNG MEN OF AMERICA, 1986.