Stories, Journalism & Vonnegut Bio Hank Nuwer
Grab a coffee and enjoy the story clearinghouse of Hank Nuwer with photos of Alaska and its wildlife by Malgorzata (Gosia) Nuwer.
You’ll find that I’ve added some finished and partially finished biography-in-progress of Kurt Vonnegut, “The Man in the Hole.”
Hank Nuwer’s Indiana University Press books on hazing. Podcast in The Culture
Podcast of “Weed in the Garden of Academe” with Hank Nuwer
Scroll down for archived Realalaskadaily stories.Thank you for reading. Got a compliment or gripe? Drop a line to Hjnuwer@Alaska.edu. Gosia and I want to keep this site ad-free. Trying to raise funds for last-minute research on my Kurt Vonnegut biography: “Kurt Vonnegut: The Man in the Hole. A Life of Reinvention.” (“Not authorized, but authentic scholarship”). Your donation would be so helpful: Hank Nuwer, PO Box 73446; Fairbanks, AK 99707-3446.
John Carlson: One of a kinder
Farewell to the best of us journos. By Hank Nuwer John Carlson started as a copyboy in the 70s at Muncie’s evening paper. Years later, gruff World War II veterans like Dick Stodghill asked him to bring over a coffee. But jokes aside, at a newspaper with many good...
Found in Translation: the story of Sue Markins and her birth mother
CELINA, OH - A little over a year ago, Sue Markins' phone rang. The caller said she was calling on behalf of her birth family in Japan. Markins, a Walmart pharmacy technician, was flummoxed by the call from an overseas stranger. "I hung right up," she recalls. "In...
Mrs. Lowell Thomas: Marianna Munn was like a Mrs. Marco Polo
Today I write about an Arcanum, Ohio native opposed not only to the start of that last war in Afghanistan, but also the Vietnam War. Her maiden name was Marianna Munn. She was the farmer’s daughter of Eva and John Munn, the latter the longtime head of the school board...
You never forget your first dog
My personality was formed by two different worlds I inhabited before I was 20 when I set out to earn a living as a writer and professor. I lived then in tough Buffalo, New York, neighborhoods during the week and on my two grandparents’ bucolic farms on weekends and...
A liife changing visit
All -- This is a remembrance of my visit to a leper colony. It may change your thinking on leprosy. It changed mine. By Hank Nuwer Some of my best feature stories never appeared in print. That’s because the era from 1976 to 1992 — when I wrote every...
Death of a Fairy-Tale Ending
Sunday, March 5, 2023 Good day, Reader: I was thinking of adding one of the strangest and saddest columns I ever penned. So here it is. I won't say, "Enjoy!" But maybe you'll learn something about groupthink with this tale from the past in Union City, Indiana. As a...
UA Fairbanks Nanooks score at will, 8-0, against never-give-up Lindenwood Lions
I spent the morning hiring freelancers for the Fairbanks Daily Miner's visitor guide, and then put on the coffee and settled into housecleaning. Two loads of laundry were followed by kitchen counter scrubbing, oven cleaning, vacuuming, swabbing all decks and,...
Gosia gets her citizenship!
My wife Gosia earned her Green Card in October 2019. She gave eight-weeks’ notice at her chief accountant job in Poland and shipped what she could to Indiana. Update: On March 22, she raises her hand for the citizenship oath and comes to Alaska eligible to vote. (She...
2021 Airbnbdisaster
Near Darke By Hank Nuwer My wife Gosia and I returned yesterday from a working vacation in Alaska. The mountains wore a majestic white cape of snow. As we drove hairpin turns on the Kenai Peninsula, the Avis rental car belched an ominous warning noise. Gulp, a...