Essays

Personal essays, in print and online.

Emigrants' Passage & New Beginnings: The Packet Ship Patrick Henry Sea History: The art, literature, adventure, lore & learning of the sea · also on Wikipedia

Josiah Gilbert Holland: Recalling Famed Newspaper Columnist on 200th Anniversary of His Birth The Springfield Republican · listen here

Chasing Family History & the Tail End of Summer on Little Egg Harbor Bay SpeakEasy, Newsworks — WHYY Philadelphia

2014 Was a Year to Sound the Horn Newsworks — WHYY Philadelphia

Philip Seymour Hoffman, Relentless in the Pursuit of the Character: An Actor Who Cut to Audience's Core The Philadelphia Inquirer

Undeniably Human: Philip Seymour Hoffman Leaves Us Breathless The Valley Advocate

Just What Was That Mysterious Flying Object Over Amherst? The Springfield Republican

All That Philip Seymour Hoffman Left Behind: His Honesty, His Truth, His Demons Newsworks

Zombie Fiction, Ebola Fact and Obsessive Fear of an Invisible Menace Newsworks

Feeling D-Day by Treating Soldiers The Kansas City Star

A Soldier's Heartfelt Holiday Dispatch The Daily Hampshire Gazette

My Ancestor at Gettysburg The Philadelphia Inquirer

With Another Death, Family Still Living Is All the More Precious at Holidays Newsworks

Loss, Remembrance, and Joy The Worcester Telegram & Gazette

Evan Connell, Mrs. Bridge and Mrs. Collins The Pitch

A Birthday Boy, At Large in the World The Daily Hampshire Gazette

Eternal Hunger Passed Down by Irish Ancestors The Philadelphia Inquirer

An Irishman's Legacy Philadelphia Inquirer Online

History's Back Story: Douglass and O'Connell Irish Philadelphia

A Doll Named Edgar Takes an American to Switzerland Pebbles, a journal of arts and literature