iHone

I was born in New York in 1954, the first of nine children to Irish immigrant parents. I grew up just across the Hudson River in the working-class town of West New York, New Jersey, a first home to waves of newcomers to this day.

I graduated from Manhattan College in 1976. Just a day after commencement, I began an eleven-year career at CBS where I held several positions in network operations and production.

Miraculously eluding drug-addiction and mental exhaustion, I joined the Jesuits in 1987 and spent the next nine years as a seminarian. It was a liberating experience, spiritually and creatively, but I came to the realization that it was not where I was to meet the world. I departed in 1996.

Within a year, I moved to St. Louis to become Production Director at the Sacred Heart Program, a Jesuit radio ministry best known for its weekly broadcast “Contact.”

The work took me across the country and around the world. I received several awards from Excellence In Media and UNDA-USA. In 2003, I shared a Gold WorldMedal at the New York Festivals with producer Amy Weese Chase for “Through The Eyes Of Love,” the story of a blind man and his seeing-eye dog who led a group of survivors from the 76th floor of the North Tower of the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001.

After the demise of Sacred Heart in 2005, I immersed myself in audiobook, multimedia and digitization projects as a freelancer.  In 2007, I was hired by the Missouri History Museum to migrate and digitize a significant portion of the video archive of former Democratic Majority Leader Richard A. Gephardt.  This work introduced me to the world of archiving, digital preservation and access.

In 2008, I won an appointment to become the Film and Media Digital Archivist at Washington University in St. Louis.  Most of my current work revolves around the Henry Hampton Collection.  Hampton, a St. Louis native and Washington University alumnus, founded Blackside, Inc., the producer of such PBS documentaries as Eyes on the Prize, Malcolm X: Make it Plain, The Great Depression and I’ll Make Me a World.

There are thousands of analog items in need of attention.  I feel like I’m laying the foundation for the pyramids.

I live in the Dogtown neighborhood of St. Louis with my wife, muse and reality check, Janelle Carron. Two stepdaughters, Amy and Erin, their dogs and boyfriends are frequent visitors.