I got my start as a writer when, as a kid of 12, my parents gave me a toy printing press for Christmas. That winter, the stories I wrote – the subjects now long forgotten – I set in rubber type which I inked and printed on paper that came with the rotary press.
I wrote for student newspapers in high school and college, then followed those experiences into the working world of public relations, writing and editing membership publications for state Farm Bureaus in Wisconsin, Michigan, and Kansas. I also did broadcast work for them. After I left an executive position more...
