John has been working in radio – mostly public radio – for 24 years. Since coming to Connecticut in 1994, he’s helped to build WNPR’s award-winning newsroom – cultivating one of the most talented news staffs in public radio. He has reported for National Public Radio on politics, economic redevelopment, drug crime, assisted suicide, tribal recognition, immigration and a surprising number of stories about sports.

He’s edited national award-winning documentaries on Connecticut history, care for the chronically ill, the evacuation of Manhattan on 9/11, and the mental health of children, and has been involved in editorial planning for Public Radio News Directors, Inc., The Public Radio Exchange, and NPR’s Local News Initiative.  He’s won awards for reporting,  hosting Where We Live, and “overall station excellence” from the AP.

Since 2004, John has served as an adjunct journalism professor at Quinnipiac University, and is now the Robert C. Vance Endowed Chair in Journalism and Mass Communication at Central Connecticut State University.  He’s also worked as an editor at NPR in Washington, and in New York as an occasional fill-in host for NPR’s Science Friday.  

He briefly worked in commercial radio in Boston, but got his start in his hometown of Pittsburgh at WDUQ.  He tells anyone he meets about the Steelers, the Pirates, the Penguins and Primanti Brothers sandwiches. John is an amateur drummer who occasionally gets to play music with other WNPR musicians.  He lives in Winsted with his wife Jennifer, and cat, Dirk.