From the beginning, all signs pointed to writing. They didn’t always direct me down a straight road, but here I am. Since January 2005, I have been a freelance writer. With 100 percent support from my husband, it was a walk off the cliff, from office job to sole proprietor. I just, plain had to write. How’d I survive? I learned from Wile E. Coyote. He can walk on air just fine. His mistake, every time, is looking down.

In 2022, I was honored to be named the inaugural Freelance Journalist of the Year by the Keystone Media Awards. In 2023, I was humbled to be named again. This award was created to recognize the contributions of freelance writers in a turbulent media world, and I am proud to represent. 

Published in:

• News media: For TheBurg, a monthly newspaper in Harrisburg, PA, I write city issues, personality profiles, and history features. My story for TheBurg on networking among Harrisburg craft food and beer producers won divisional first place for business or consumer story in the 2017 Keystone Media Awards. For eight years with Pennlive.com/Harrisburg Patriot-News, I covered municipalities and school districts, wrote breaking news and features, and published a weekly community column.
• Magazines: American Gas, Mobility (the Workforce Mobility Association), Pennsylvania Pursuits, Wine-Spirits Quarterly, Susquehanna Style, Harrisburg, Central PA. Topics include history, natural gas distribution, travel, home style, health, personnel relocation, wine, the arts and people. For Harrisburg magazine’s experiential series “Adventure Chick,” I handled a python, and took pitches from a big-league pitcher.
• Business websites and newsletters: Cleveland Brothers Caterpillar, Pennsylvania Partnerships for Children, Early Learning Investment Commission, Fight Crime: Invest in Kids, Pennsylvania Association of Intermediate Units, and Harrisburg University of Science and Technology.
• Author, Well-Behaved Taverns Seldom Make History.

Before freelancing, I was vice president for communications for Pennsylvania Partnerships for Children, a dynamic statewide advocacy organization promoting policies that benefit kids. Before that, I was press secretary for 10 hectic, exhilarating years for a Pennsylvania House of Representatives caucus leader and gubernatorial candidate. I first built writing and publishing experience as publications director at the Pennsylvania Newspaper Publishers’ Association, and as reporter at the Hanover, PA, Evening Sun.

Education: Master's, creative nonfiction, Goucher College; American Studies, Penn State; Journalism, Indiana University of Pennsylvania.

John P. McCormick