Mitchell David "Mitch" Albom (born May 23, 1958) is an
AmericanThe United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
best-selling author, journalist, screenwriter, dramatist, radio and television broadcaster and musician. His books have sold over 30 million copies worldwide. Having achieved national recognition for his sports writing in the earlier part of his career, he is perhaps best known for the inspirational stories and themes that weave through his books, plays and films. He is also well-known for his philanthropic work in
Detroit, MichiganDetroit is the major city among the primary cultural, financial, and transportation centers in the Metro Detroit area, a region of 5.2 million people. As the seat of Wayne County, the city of Detroit is the largest city in the U.S. state of Michigan and serves as a major port on the Detroit River...
where he founded four charities.
Family
Albom was born in
Passaic, New JerseyPassaic is a city in Passaic County, New Jersey, United States. As of the 2010 United States Census, the city had a total population of 69,781, maintaining its status as the 15th largest municipality in New Jersey with an increase of 1,920 residents from the 2000 Census population of 67,861...
and briefly lived in
Buffalo, New YorkBuffalo is the second most populous city in the state of New York, after New York City. Located in Western New York on the eastern shores of Lake Erie and at the head of the Niagara River across from Fort Erie, Ontario, Buffalo is the seat of Erie County and the principal city of the...
before moving back to
Haddon Township, New JerseyHaddon Township is a Township in Camden County, New Jersey, United States. As of the United States 2010 Census, the township population was 14,707....
as a child, where he attended a synagogue led by Rabbi
Albert L. LewisRabbi Albert L. Lewis was a leading American Conservative rabbi, scholar, and author; President of the Rabbinical Assembly , the international organization of Conservative rabbis; and Vice-President of The World Council of Synagogues...
, the subject of his book,
Have a Little Faith. After attending high schools in Southern New Jersey and Philadelphia, including Akiba Hebrew Academy in Lower Merion, Albom went on to
Brandeis UniversityBrandeis University is an American private research university with a liberal arts focus. It is located in the southwestern corner of Waltham, Massachusetts, nine miles west of Boston. The University has an enrollment of approximately 3,200 undergraduate and 2,100 graduate students. In 2011, it...
in
Waltham, MassachusettsWaltham is a city in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States, was an early center for the labor movement, and major contributor to the American Industrial Revolution. The original home of the Boston Manufacturing Company, the city was a prototype for 19th century industrial city planning,...
to earn a bachelor’s degree in sociology. Pursuing his dream to become a musician, he worked after graduation for several years in nightclubs in the US and Europe. He discovered an aptitude for writing and eventually returned to graduate school, earning a Master's degree from Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism, followed by an MBA from Columbia University’s Graduate School of Business.
In 1995, he married Janine Sabino.
They live in suburban Detroit,
MichiganMichigan is a U.S. state located in the Great Lakes Region of the United States of America. The name Michigan is the French form of the Ojibwa word mishigamaa, meaning "large water" or "large lake"....
. They currently have no children.
Early days as a musician
Albom’s original dream was to become a musician, and he played in numerous bands in high school and college. He studied jazz piano with several teachers, including a brief stretch with the well-respected
Charlie BanacosCharlie Banacos was an American pianist, composer, author and educator, concentrating on jazz.Banacos created over 100 courses of study for improvisation and composition. His concepts of teaching and his courses influenced educators since the late 1950s...
at the
Berklee College of MusicBerklee College of Music, located in Boston, Massachusetts, is the largest independent college of contemporary music in the world. Known primarily as a school for jazz, rock and popular music, it also offers college-level courses in a wide range of contemporary and historic styles, including hip...
in
Boston, MassachusettsBoston is the capital of and largest city in Massachusetts, and is one of the oldest cities in the United States. The largest city in New England, Boston is regarded as the unofficial "Capital of New England" for its economic and cultural impact on the entire New England region. The city proper had...
. In 1979, having graduated from college, Albom traveled to Europe and found work as a piano player and singer in a taverna on the island of Crete.
Columnist
While living in New York, Albom developed an interest in journalism. Still supporting himself by working nights in the music industry, he began to write during the day for the
Queens Tribune, a weekly newspaper based in Flushing, New York. To help build his portfolio, he wrote for local supermarket circulars. Sticking with it, his work there helped earn him entry into
Columbia UniversityColumbia University in the City of New York is a private, Ivy League university in Manhattan, New York City. Columbia is the oldest institution of higher learning in the state of New York, the fifth oldest in the United States, and one of the country's nine Colonial Colleges founded before the...
's prestigious Graduate School of Journalism. During his time there, to help pay his tuition he took work as a babysitter. In addition to nighttime piano playing, Albom took a part-time job with
SPORTSport is a free French and London-based weekly sports magazine. It specialises in football, rugby, and tennis, together with handball in France and cricket in London...
magazine, which kindled his interest in sports writing. Upon graduation, he freelanced in that field for publications such as
Sports Illustrated,
GEO, and
The Philadelphia Inquirer, and covered several Olympic sports events in Europe – including track and field and luge — paying his own way for travel, and selling articles once he was there. In 1983, he was hired as a full-time feature writer for
The Fort Lauderdale News Sun Sentinel, and eventually promoted to columnist. In 1985, having won that year’s
Associated PressThe Associated Press is an American news agency. The AP is a cooperative owned by its contributing newspapers, radio and television stations in the United States, which both contribute stories to the AP and use material written by its staff journalists...
Sports Editors award for best Sports News Story, Albom was hired as lead sports columnist for the
Detroit Free Press to replace
Mike DowneyMike Downey is an American newspaper columnist.From 2003 to 2008, Downey wrote the "In the Wake of the News" column for the Chicago Tribune originated by Ring Lardner in 1913...
, a popular columnist who had taken a job with the
Los Angeles Times.
Albom’s sports column became quickly popular with readers. In 1989, when the
Detroit Free Press and the
Detroit News merged weekend publications under a Joint Operating Agreement, Albom was asked by his newspaper to add a weekly non-sports column to his duties. That column ran on Sundays in the “Comment” section, and dealt with American life and values. It was eventually syndicated across the country. Both columns continue today in the
Detroit Free Press.
Albom, during his years in Detroit, became one of the most award-winning sports writers of his era; he was named best sports columnist in the nation a record 13 times by the Associated Press Sports Editors, and won best feature writing honors from that same organization a record seven times. No other writer has received the award more than once. He has won more than 200 other writing honors from organizations including the National Headliner Awards, the American Society of Newspaper Editors, the National Sportscasters and Sportswriting Association, and National Association of Black Journalists. On June 25, 2010, Albom was awarded the APSE's Red Smith Award for lifetime achievement, presented at the annual APSE convention in Salt Lake City, Utah. The selection was heavily criticized by a number of Albom's peers, including fellow Red Smith Award winner Dave Kindred. Many of his columns have been collected into anthology books including
Live Albom I (Detroit Free Press, 1988),
Live Albom II (Detroit Free Press, 1990),
Live Albom III (Detroit Free Press, 1992), and
Live Albom IV (Detroit Free Press, 1995).
Albom also serves as a contributing editor to
Parade magazine
Parade is an American nationwide Sunday newspaper magazine, distributed in more than 500 newspapers in the United States. It was founded in 1941 and is owned by Advance Publications. The most widely read magazine in the U.S., Parade has a circulation of 32.2 million and a readership of nearly 70...
.
Sports books
Albom's first non-anthology book was
Bo: Life, Laughs, and the Lessons of a College Football Legend (Warner Books), an autobiography of football coach
Bo SchembechlerGlenn Edward "Bo" Schembechler, Jr. was an American football player, coach, and athletics administrator. He served as the head football coach at Miami University from 1963 to 1968 and at the University of Michigan from 1969 to 1989, compiling a career record of 234–65–8...
co-written with the coach. The book was published in August, 1989 and became Albom's first
New York Times bestseller.
Albom's next book was
Fab Five: Basketball, Trash Talk, The American Dream, a look into the starters on the University of Michigan men's basketball team that reached the NCAA championship game as freshmen in 1992 and again as sophomores in 1993. The book was published in November 1994 and also became a
New York Times bestseller.
Tuesdays with Morrie
Albom's breakthrough book came about after a friend of his viewed
Morrie SchwartzMorris "Morrie" S. Schwartz was a sociology professor at Brandeis University and an author. He was the subject of the best-selling book Tuesdays With Morrie, which was published in 1997 and later made into a movie....
's interview with
Ted KoppelEdward James "Ted" Koppel is an English-born American broadcast journalist, best known as the anchor for Nightline from the program's inception in 1980 until his retirement in late 2005. After leaving Nightline, Koppel worked as managing editor for the Discovery Channel before resigning in 2008...
on ABC News
Nightline in 1995, in which Schwartz, a sociology professor, spoke about living and dying with a terminal disease,
ALSALS refers to amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, also known as Lou Gehrig's diseaseIt may also refer to:-Medicine:* Advanced life support, a level of medical training* Anterolateral system, part of the nervous system...
(amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, or Lou Gehrig's disease). Albom, who had been close with Schwartz during his college years at Brandeis, felt guilty about not keeping in touch so he reconnected with his former professor, visiting him in suburban Boston and eventually coming every Tuesday for discussions about life and death. Albom, seeking a way to pay for Schwartz's medical bills, sought out a publisher for a book about their visits. Although rejected by numerous publishing houses, the idea was accepted by Doubleday shortly before Schwartz's death, and Albom was able to fulfill his wish to pay off Schwartz's bills.
The book,
Tuesdays with Morrie, was published in 1997, a small volume that chronicled Albom's time spent with his professor. The initial printing was 20,000 copies. Word of mouth grew the book sales slowly and a brief appearance on "The Oprah Winfrey Show" nudged the book onto the
New York Times bestseller's list in October 1997. It steadily climbed, reaching the No. 1 position six months later. It remained on the New York Times bestseller list for 205 weeks. One of the top selling memoirs of all time,
Tuesdays With Morrie has sold over 14 million copies and has been translated into 41 languages.
Oprah WinfreyOprah Winfrey is an American media proprietor, talk show host, actress, producer and philanthropist. Winfrey is best known for her self-titled, multi-award-winning talk show, which has become the highest-rated program of its kind in history and was nationally syndicated from 1986 to 2011...
produced a television movie adaptation
by the same nameTuesdays with Morrie is a 1999 television film adaptation of the Mitch Albom's book of the same title. It features Jack Lemmon in a role for which he won an Emmy award.-Cast and characters:* Jack Lemmon – Morrie Schwartz* Hank Azaria – Mitch Albom...
for ABC, starring
Hank AzariaHenry Albert "Hank" Azaria is an American film, television and stage actor, director, voice actor, and comedian. He is noted for being one of the principal voice actors on the animated television series The Simpsons , on which he performs the voices of Moe Szyslak, Apu Nahasapeemapetilon, Chief...
as Albom and
Jack LemmonJohn Uhler "Jack" Lemmon III was an American actor and musician. He starred in more than 60 films including Some Like It Hot, The Apartment, Mister Roberts , Days of Wine and Roses, The Great Race, Irma la Douce, The Odd Couple, Save the Tiger John Uhler "Jack" Lemmon III (February 8, 1925June...
as Morrie. It was the most-watched TV movie of 1999 and won four Emmy Awards. A two-man theater play was later co-authored by Albom and playwright Jeffrey Hatcher and opened Off Broadway in the fall of 2001, starring Alvin Epstein as Morrie and Jon Tenney as Albom.
Tuesdays With Morrie' is regularly taught in high schools and universities around the world, and is also taught in some primary schools in Asia, due to its very simple writing. Albom started a private foundation with some of the proceeds, The Tuesdays With Mitch Foundation, to fund various charitable efforts.
The Five People You Meet in Heaven
After the success of Tuesdays with Morrie
, Albom's next foray was in fiction. His follow-up book was The Five People You Meet in Heaven
(Hyperion Books) published in September 2003. Although released six years after Tuesdays With Morrie
, the book was a fast success and again launched Albom onto the New York Times
best-seller list. The Five People You Meet in Heaven
sold over 10 million copies in 38 territories and in 35 languages. In 2004, it was turned into a television movie for ABC, starring Jon Voight, Ellen Burstyn, Michael Imperioli and Jeff Daniels. Directed by Lloyd Kramer, the film was critically acclaimed and the most watched TV movie of the year, with 18.6 million viewers.
The Five People You Meet in Heaven is the story of Eddie, a wounded war veteran who lives what he believes is an uninspired and lonely life fixing rides at a seaside amusement park. On his 83rd birthday, Eddie is killed while trying to save a little girl from a falling ride. He awakes in the afterlife, where he learns that heaven is not a location but a place in which your life is explained to you by five people who were in, who affected, or were affected by, your life.
Albom has said the book was inspired by his real life uncle, Eddie Beitchman, who, like the character, served during World War II in the Philippines, and died when he was 83. Eddie told Albom, as a child, about a time he was rushed to surgery and had a near-death experience, his soul floating above the bed. There, Eddie said, he saw all his dead relatives waiting for him at the edge of the bed. Albom has said that image of people waiting when you die inspired his concept of The Five People You Meet in Heaven
For One More Day
Albom's second novel, For One More Day (Hyperion), was published in 2006. The hardcover edition spent nine months on the New York Times Bestseller list after debuting at the top spot. It also reached No. 1 on USA Today and Publishers Weekly bestseller lists. It was the first book to be sold by Starbucks in the launch of the Book Break Program in the fall of 2006. It has been translated into 26 languages. On December 9, 2007, the ABC aired the 2-hour television event motion picture
Oprah Winfrey Presents: Mitch Albom's For One More DayFor One More Day is a 2007 television film adaptation of the Mitch Albom's novel by the same title, which was a The New York Times Best Seller. Produced by Oprah Winfrey's Harpo Productions, the film stars Michael Imperioli and Ellen Burstyn as leads. Director Lloyd Kramer, also directed the TV...
, which starred Michael ImperioliJames Michael Imperioli , commonly known as Michael Imperioli, is an American actor and television writer. He is perhaps best known for his role as Christopher Moltisanti on The Sopranos for which he won the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Drama Series in 2004. He also...
and Ellen BurstynEllen Burstyn is a leading American actress of film, stage, and television. Burstyn's career began in theatre during the late 1950s, and over the next ten years she appeared in several films and television series before joining the Actors Studio in 1967...
. Burstyn received a Screen Actors’ Guild award nomination for her role as Posey Benetto.
For One More Day is about a son who gets to spend a day with his mother who died eight years earlier. Charley “Chick” Benetto is a retired baseball player who, facing the pain of unrealized dreams, alcoholism, divorce, and an estrangement from his grown daughter, returns to his childhood home and attempts suicide. There he meets his long dead mother, who welcomes him as if nothing ever happened. The book explores the question, “What would you do if you had one more day with someone you’ve lost?”
Albom has said his relationship with his own mother was largely behind the story of that book, and that several incidents in For One More Day
are actual events from his childhood.
Have a Little Faith
Have a Little Faith
, which was Albom's first nonfiction book since Tuesdays With Morrie
, was released on September 29, 2009 through Hyperion publishing, recounts Albom's experience writing the eulogy for Albert L. LewisRabbi Albert L. Lewis was a leading American Conservative rabbi, scholar, and author; President of the Rabbinical Assembly , the international organization of Conservative rabbis; and Vice-President of The World Council of Synagogues...
, a Rabbi from his hometown in New Jersey. The book is written in the same vein as Tuesdays With Morrie
, in which the main character, Mitch, goes through several heartfelt conversations with the Rabbi in order to better know and understand the man that he would one day eulogize. Through this experience, Albom writes, his own sense of faith was reawakened, leading him to make contact with Henry Covington, the African-American pastor of the I Am My Brother's Keeper church, in Detroit, where Albom was then living. Covington, a past drug addict, dealer, and ex-convict, ministered to a congregation of largely homeless men and women in a church so poor that the roof leaked when it rained. From his relationships with these two very different men of faith, Albom writes about the difference faith can make in the world.
On November 27, 2011, ABC aired the
Hallmark Hall of FameHallmark Hall of Fame is an anthology program on American television, sponsored by Hallmark Cards, a Kansas City based greeting card company. The second longest-running television program in the history of television, it has a historically long run, beginning in 1951 and continuing into 2011...
television movie based on the book.
Radio host
Albom began on radio in 1987 on WLLZ-Detroit, a now-defunct Active Rock radio station. He worked on the station’s morning program as a sports commentator, and started a Sunday night sports-talk program, The Sunday Sports Albom in 1988, believed to be one of the first sports talk shows to ever air on FM radio.
In 1996, Albom moved to
WJRWJR is a radio station in Detroit, Michigan, United States. It broadcasts a news/talk format. It is a class A clear channel station whose broadcasts can be heard throughout most of the Midwest, eastern United States and Canada at night, making it one of the most powerful radio stations in the...
, a powerful, 50,000 watt clear-channel AM station in Detroit. His five-day a week program is a general
talk showTalk radio is a radio format containing discussion about topical issues. Most shows are regularly hosted by a single individual, and often feature interviews with a number of different guests. Talk radio typically includes an element of listener participation, usually by broadcasting live...
with an emphasis on entertainment, writing, current events and culture. He has been honored numerous times by the Michigan Association of Broadcasters as the top afternoon talk show host, and was voted best talk show host in Detroit by Hour Detroit
magazine. In 2001, the show was televised nationally in a simulcast by MSNBC. Albom continues to do the show from 5 to 7 p.m. ET. Following his Monday show, he will host an hour-long sports talk show called "The Monday Sports Album" that airs from 7 to 8 p.m. ET.
Television
Albom appears regularly on ESPN's The Sports Reporters
(airs Sunday mornings from Studio A in Bristol, CT at ESPN Plaza at 9:00am EST) and SportsCenter
. He has also made appearances on Costas Now, The Oprah Winfrey Show, The Today Show, CBS’s The Early Show, ABC’s Good Morning America, Dr. Phil
, Larry King Live
, The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson
, and most recently appeared as a guest voice on "The SimpsonsThe Simpsons is an American animated sitcom created by Matt Groening for the Fox Broadcasting Company. The series is a satirical parody of a middle class American lifestyle epitomized by its family of the same name, which consists of Homer, Marge, Bart, Lisa and Maggie...
" on the episode Thursdays with Abie"Thursdays with Abie" is the ninth episode of The Simpsons twenty-first season. It aired on the Fox Broadcasting Company in the United States on January 3, 2010. In the episode, Grampa meets a human interest journalist who writes and publishes Grampa's life stories making Homer jealous and while...
.
Playwright
On November 19, 2002, the stage version of
Tuesdays with Morrie opened Off Broadway at the Minetta Lane Theatre. Co-authored by Mitch Albom and
Jeffrey HatcherJeffrey Hatcher is a playwright and screenwriter. He wrote the stage play Compleat Female Stage Beauty, which he later adapted into a screenplay, shortened to just Stage Beauty...
(
Three Viewings) and directed by David Esbjornson (The Goat or Who Is Sylvia?).
Tuesdays with Morrie starred Alvin Epstein (original Lucky in
Waiting for Godot) as Morrie and Jon Tenney (
The Heiress) as Mitch.
Albom’s follow up to the stage adaptation of
Tuesdays were two original comedies that premiered at The Purple Rose Theater, in
Chelsea, MichiganChelsea is a city in Washtenaw County in the U.S. state of Michigan. The population was 4,398 at the 2000 census, at which time it was a village....
, a theater started by actor
Jeff DanielsJeffrey Warren "Jeff" Daniels is an American actor, musician and playwright. He founded a non-profit theatre company, the Purple Rose Theatre Company, in his home state of Michigan...
.
Duck Hunter Shoots Angel (The Purple Rose’s highest grossing play as of 2008) and
And the Winner Is have both been produced nationwide, with the latter having its West Coast premiere at the Laguna Playhouse in
Laguna Beach, CaliforniaLaguna Beach is a seaside resort city and artist community located in southern Orange County, California, United States, approximately southwest of the county seat of Santa Ana...
.
Musician
Albom is an accomplished songwriter and lyricist. In 1992, he wrote the song "Cookin' For Two" for a television movie,
Christmas in Connecticut, directed by
Arnold SchwarzeneggerArnold Alois Schwarzenegger is an Austrian-American former professional bodybuilder, actor, businessman, investor, and politician. Schwarzenegger served as the 38th Governor of California from 2003 until 2011....
. The song was nominated for The CableACE Award. Albom has been featured on the cover of
Making Music MagazineMaking Music Magazine is a bi-monthly lifestyle music magazine devoted to the recreational musician and all instruments and genres of music. Their tag line is "Better Living Through Recreational Music Making."...
. He also wrote the song "Hit Somebody (The Hockey Song)", which was recorded by singer/songwriter
Warren ZevonWarren William Zevon was an American rock singer-songwriter and musician noted for including his sometimes sardonic opinions of life in his musical lyrics, composing songs that were sometimes humorous and often had political or historical themes.Zevon's work has often been praised by well-known...
, with
David LettermanDavid Michael Letterman is an American television host and comedian. He hosts the late night television talk show, Late Show with David Letterman, broadcast on CBS. Letterman has been a fixture on late night television since the 1982 debut of Late Night with David Letterman on NBC...
on backup vocals. The song was released as a single in Canada and will be adapted into a film by director
Kevin SmithKevin Patrick Smith is an American screenwriter, actor, film producer, and director, as well as a popular comic book writer, author, comedian/raconteur, and internet radio personality best recognized by viewers as Silent Bob...
. He currently performs with the
Rock Bottom RemaindersThe Rock Bottom Remainders is a rock and roll band consisting of published writers, most of them both amateur musicians and popular English-language book, magazine, and newspaper authors. The band took its self-mocking name from the publishing term remaindered book, a work of which the unsold...
, a band of writers that also features
Dave BarryDavid "Dave" Barry is a Pulitzer Prize-winning American author and columnist, who wrote a nationally syndicated humor column for The Miami Herald from 1983 to 2005. He has also written numerous books of humor and parody, as well as comedic novels.-Biography:Barry was born in Armonk, New York,...
,
Stephen KingStephen Edwin King is an American author of contemporary horror, suspense, science fiction and fantasy fiction. His books have sold more than 350 million copies and have been adapted into a number of feature films, television movies and comic books...
,
Ridley PearsonRidley Pearson, born on March 13, 1953 in Glen Cove, New York, is an American writer. Pearson has historically written suspense and thriller novels for an adult audience, but has also begun branching out by writing adventure books for children....
,
Amy TanAmy Tan is an American writer whose works explore mother-daughter relationships. Her most well-known work is The Joy Luck Club, which has been translated into 35 languages...
,
Kathi Kamen GoldmarkKathi Kamen Goldmark is an American author, columnist, publishing consultant, radio and music producer, songwriter, and musician...
,
Sam Barry (Author)Samuel "Sam" Barry is an American author, columnist, publishing professional, and musician. Barry writes a national column and blog for BookPage with his wife, author Kathi Kamen Goldmark...
, and
Scott TurowScott F. Turow is an American author and a practicing lawyer. Turow has written eight fiction and two nonfiction books, which have been translated into over 20 languages and have sold over 25 million copies...
. Their performances raise funds for various children’s literacy projects across the country. He is also featured in Making Music Magazine.
The Dream Fund
"The Dream Fund," established in 1989, provides scholarship for disadvantaged children to study the arts.
A Time to Help
In 1998, Albom started a Detroit volunteer group called "A Time to Help". Every month, the group (affiliated with Volunteer Impact) does a project to help serve and improve the Detroit community. Projects have included work at homeless shelters, food banks, senior citizens homes, and a school for the underprivileged or handicapped. Albom and radio co-host Ken Brown lead each project and try to use the group as a catalyst to increase volunteerism.
S.A.Y. Detroit
S.A.Y. (Super All Year) Detroit is an umbrella program that funds shelters and cares for the homeless. It began in 2006 in reaction to the city’s plan to provide temporary shelter for Detroit’s homeless only during Super Bowl XL weekend. Albom spent a night in a shelter to call attention to the issue, and as a result was able to raise over $350,000 in less than two weeks. It is now a 501(c)3 nonprofit organization that funds numerous homeless shelters throughout the Metro Detroit area.
A Hole in the Roof Foundation
His most recent effort, A Hole in the Roof Foundation, helps faith groups of every denomination who care for the homeless repair the spaces in which they carry out their work. The seed that gave root to the Foundation – and also inspired its name—was the hole in the roof of the I Am My Brother's Keeper church in inner-city Detroit, written about in Have a Little Faith.
A Hole in the Roof Foundation raises and distributes funds to help pay for the materials and labor that are needed to help faith groups make such repairs to their most essential infrastructure: replacing broken windows; shoring up load-bearing walls or loose foundations; repairing leaks and other plumbing problems; fixing or replacing heating sources. Their first project was the I Am My Brother’s Keeper roof in the crumbling but vibrant Detroit church, completed in December 2009. The second project, completed in April 2010, was the rebuilding of the Caring and Sharing Mission and Orphanage in Port-au-Prince, Haiti.
In the spotlight
In 1995, during a hotly-contested strike at the
Detroit Free Press that gained national attention, Albom crossed the picket line and returned to work; some labor groups criticized him and others who cross the picket lines as a "
scabScab can refer to the following:* Scab, a hard coating on the skin formed during the wound healing reconstruction phase* Derogatory term for a strikebreaker, a person who works despite strike action or against the will of other employees...
".
In 1999, Albom was named National Hospice Organization's Man of the Year.
In 2000, at the
Emmy AwardsThe 52nd Annual Primetime Emmy Awards were held Sunday, September 10, 2000. The awards show was hosted by Garry Shandling and was broadcast on ABC...
, Albom was personally thanked by actor
Jack LemmonJohn Uhler "Jack" Lemmon III was an American actor and musician. He starred in more than 60 films including Some Like It Hot, The Apartment, Mister Roberts , Days of Wine and Roses, The Great Race, Irma la Douce, The Odd Couple, Save the Tiger John Uhler "Jack" Lemmon III (February 8, 1925June...
during his acceptance speech for his Emmy for Best Actor in a TV Movie or Miniseries for
Tuesdays With Morrie. It would be Lemmon’s last major acting role.
In February 2003, Albom was called to testify at
Chris WebberMayce Edward Christopher "Chris" Webber, III , nicknamed C-Webb, is a retired American professional basketball player. He is a five-time NBA All-Star, a former All-NBA First Teamer, a former NBA Rookie of the Year, and a former #1 overall NBA Draftee...
's perjury trial. Webber had been a member of the
University of MichiganThe University of Michigan is a public research university located in Ann Arbor, Michigan in the United States. It is the state's oldest university and the flagship campus of the University of Michigan...
's basketball teams of the early 1990s. He was a member of the "Fab Five" players, the subject of a book by Albom. Webber and three other Wolverines who played in the 1990s were alleged to have received over $290,000 in improper loans from a man considered to be a booster of the University of Michigan, although amounts were never verified. The four other Fab Five members were not implicated and the school was cleared of any direct involvement or knowledge of the loans, which were made to players and their families.
In 2005, Albom and four editors were briefly suspended from the
Detroit Free Press after Albom filed a column that stated two college basketball players were in the crowd at an NCAA tournament game, when in fact they were not. In a column printed in the Sunday, April 3, Albom described two former Michigan State basketball players, both now in the NBA, attending an NCAA Final Four semifinal game on Saturday to cheer for their school. The players had told Albom they planned to attend, so Albom, filing on his normal Friday deadline but knowing the column could not come out until Sunday – after the game was over - wrote the players were there. The
Detroit Free Press also suspended the four editors who had read the column and allowed it to go through to print. But the players' plans changed at the last minute and they did not attend the game. Albom was in attendance at the game, but the columnist failed to check on the two players’ presence.
On November 22, 2005, Albom was the sole and final guest on
Ted KoppelEdward James "Ted" Koppel is an English-born American broadcast journalist, best known as the anchor for Nightline from the program's inception in 1980 until his retirement in late 2005. After leaving Nightline, Koppel worked as managing editor for the Discovery Channel before resigning in 2008...
's farewell appearance on ABC’s
Nightline. Koppel had gotten to know Albom through his broadcasts with Morrie Schwartz and the final program dealt with the legacy of those shows and Albom’s book.
In October, 2006, Albom’s third novel,
For One More Day was chosen as the first book to be sold in
StarbucksStarbucks Corporation is an international coffee and coffeehouse chain based in Seattle, Washington. Starbucks is the largest coffeehouse company in the world, with 17,009 stores in 55 countries, including over 11,000 in the United States, over 1,000 in Canada, over 700 in the United Kingdom, and...
. At Albom’s request, one dollar from each book went to Jumpstart, a charity created to aid literacy in underprivileged areas. On a single day, October 26, as part of the promotion, customer-led book discussions were held in stores in 25 major markets, and Albom spoke, via phone, with all of them.
On October 22, 2007, Albom appeared with former New York Governor
Mario CuomoMario Matthew Cuomo served as the 52nd Governor of New York from 1983 to 1994, and is the father of Andrew Cuomo, the current governor of New York.-Early life:...
and
Tony BennettTony Bennett is an American singer of popular music, standards, show tunes, and jazz....
in “An Evening with Tony Bennett” to honor the release of Bennett’s
Tony Bennett In The Studio: A Life of Art and Music, for which Albom wrote the foreword. The event was held at the Barnes & Noble Store in Union Square, New York
On May 30, 2008, Albom delivered the commencement address at his nephew’s high school graduation in Nice, France. In July of that year,
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released the speech exclusively on
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. Albom’s shares of the proceeds were donated to his charity for the homeless, S.A.Y. Detroit.
Selected books
- Tuesdays with Morrie
Tuesdays with Morrie is a 1997 non-fiction novel by American writer Mitch Albom. The story was later adapted by Thomas Rickman into a TV movie of the same name directed by Mick Jackson, which aired on 5 December 1999 and starred Jack Lemmon and Hank Azaria...
(1997) ISBN 076790592X
- The Five People You Meet in Heaven
The Five People You Meet in Heaven is a novel by Mitch Albom. It recounts the life and death of an old maintenance man named Eddie. After dying in an accident, Eddie finds himself in heaven where he encounters five people who have significantly affected his life, whether he realized at the time or...
(2003) ISBN 0786868716
- For One More Day (2006) ISBN 1401303277
- Have a Little Faith: A True Story
Have a Little Faith is a 2009 non-fiction book by Mitch Albom, author of previous works that include Tuesdays with Morrie and The Five People You Meet in Heaven...
(2009) ISBN 0786868724
External links