Timothy Egan
Pulitzer Prize-Winning Journalist,
National Book Award-Winning Author

Timothy Egan is the author of six books. His most recent: "The Big Burn: Teddy Roosevelt and the Fire that Saved America," (Fall 2009). In it, Mr. Egan shares the story of the largest-ever forest fire in America through the eyes of those who experienced it. The tragic fire also inspired President Teddy Roosevelt's and his chief forester Gifford Pinchot's pioneering efforts toward land conservation.

His New York Times Bestseller "The Worst Hard Time" won the 2006 National Book Award for nonfiction, considered one of the nation's highest literary honors. 

Mr. Egan also wrote Breaking Blue: How one man’s hunt through a half-century of police cover ups unlocked the secret to the nation’s oldest continuing murder investigation, about 1935 murder of Town Marshal George Conniff in Spokane, WA.

He was also extensively featured in the 2008 History Channel program, entitled "Black Blizzard," which was built largely around his "Worst Hard Time" book.

Mr. Egan shares a Pulitzer Prize, from 2001, as part of a team of New York Times reporters for their series, How Race Is Lived in America. He has done special projects on the West and the decline of rural America, and he has followed the entire length of the Lewis and Clark Trail for a series in the New York Times. Mr. Egan is also a radio essayist for the BBC, one of the regular contributors to the "Letter from America" feature started by the late Alistair Cooke.

Mr. Egan is currently an online, op-ed columnist for the New York Times, writing his "Outposts" opinion feature once a week - with a Western perspective. It's often among the most read pieces in the publication.

For 18 years, Mr. Egan worked as a reporter for the Times, based in Seattle and roaming the West. He has covered everything from the Exxon Valdez oil spill, to the O.J. Simpson trial to the collapse of small town America in the Great Plains.

His additional books include: "The Good Rain: Across Time and Terrain in the Pacific Northwest," which has been a regional bestseller for twelve years, and was rated in a poll by the Seattle Post-Intelligencer as one of ten essential books ever written about the region....and "Lasso the Wind, Away to the New West." Lasso the Wind won the 1999 Governor's Writing Award from Washington State and the Mountains and Plains Booksellers.

A graduate of the University of Washington, Mr. Egan was also awarded an honorary doctorate of humane letters by Whitman College in 2000 for his writings on the land.

A third-generation Westerner, Mr. Egan lives in Seattle.

His speaking style is authentic, heartfelt, passionate and at times, very funny.

SAMPLE SPEECHES GIVEN BY TIMOTHY EGAN

The Good Rain and The Good Life in the Pacific NW

Tourism and Regional affairs and Explaining Seattle

Kickoff speech to Japan/America Society. Group comprised of some of the most prominent leaders under age 40 in both countries. Speech on the nature of Seattle.

Keynote, Washington State Historical Society, 2006, on Northwest true identity.

Environment and the West

Arizona Humanities annual gathering, Phoenix 2005, speech on the West and finding your place.

Honored as the Wallace Stegner writer/speaker at the Trust for Public Land's annual fundraiser in Seattle, 2003. Group is prominent national environmental organization.

Water and the West, Washington Legal Seminar

National Affairs

Keynote speech, Portland State University, on the importance of narrative in national affairs

Commencement Address, Whitman College

Writing

Pacific Northwest Writers Association, speech, 2006, given Lifetime Achievement Award.

Poynter Institute, numerous lectures on writing, meetings in Seattle and Portland.

Travels from: Seattle

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