Mitchell David Albom (born May 23, 1958) is an American author, journalist, and musician.
As of 2021, books he had authored had sold over 40 million copies worldwide.
Having achieved national recognition for sports writing in his early career, he turned to writing inspirational stories and themes—a preeminent early one being Tuesdays with Morrie—themes that now weave their way through his books, plays, and films and stageplays.
Albom was born on May 23, 1958 in Passaic, New Jersey; he lived in Buffalo, New York for a little while until his family settled in Oaklyn, New Jersey, just outside of Philadelphia.
He is of Jewish descent.
1979
Albom earned a bachelor's degree in sociology in 1979 from Brandeis University, and after forays into music and journalism, returned to academia to earn graduate master's degrees in journalism (at Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism), and business (from Columbia University Graduate School of Business), paying his tuition in part through employment playing piano.
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 in Flushing, New York.
His work there helped earn him entry into the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.
To help pay his tuition he took work as a babysitter.
In addition to nighttime piano playing, Albom took a part-time job with SPORT magazine.
After graduation he freelanced as a sportswriter for Sports Illustrated, GEO, and The Philadelphia Inquirer, and covered Olympic sports events in Europe – including track and field and luge – paying his own way for travel, and selling articles once he was there.
1983
In 1983, he was hired as a full-time feature writer for The Fort Lauderdale News and Sun Sentinel, and eventually promoted to columnist.
1985
In 1985, having won that year's Associated Press Sports Editors award for best Sports News Story, Albom was hired as lead sports columnist for the Detroit Free Press to replace Mike Downey, a popular columnist who had taken a job with the Los Angeles Times.
Albom's sports column quickly became popular.
1988
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.
His column is syndicated by Tribune Content Agency.
1989
In 1989, when the Detroit Free Press and the Detroit News merged weekend publications, Albom was asked 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 in the Detroit Free Press.
The book was published in August 1989 and became Albom's first New York Times bestseller.
1992
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.
1993
The book was published in November 1993 and also became a New York Times bestseller.
1995
Albom's breakthrough book came about after he was rotating the TV channels and viewed Morrie Schwartz's interview with Ted Koppel on ABC News Nightline in 1995, in which Schwartz, a sociology professor, spoke about living and dying with a terminal disease, ALS (amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, or Lou Gehrig's disease).
Albom, who was close to Schwartz during his college years at Brandeis University, 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, Doubleday accepted the idea shortly before Schwartz's death, and Albom was able to fulfill his wish to pay Schwartz's bills.
2005
In 2005, Albom and four editors were briefly suspended from the Detroit Free Press after Albom wrote a column that stated that 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 April 3, 2005, edition, Albom described two former Michigan State basketball players, both then 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 that the players were there.
But the players' plans changed at the last minute and they did not attend the game.
The Detroit Free Press also suspended the four editors who had read the column and allowed it to go to print.
Albom was in attendance at the game, but the columnist failed to check on the two players' presence.
A later internal investigation found no other similar instances in Albom's past columns, but did cite an editorial-wide problem of routinely using unattributed quotes from other sources.
Carol Leigh Hutton, publisher of the Detroit Free Press at the time of these events, later told Buzzfeed that she regretted the way it was handled.
"It was a stupid mistake that Mitch made that others failed to catch but not at all indicative of some problem that required the response we gave it. I allowed myself to believe that we were doing this highly credible, highly transparent thing, when really in hindsight what I think we were doing was acquiescing to people who were taking advantage of a stupid mistake."
As of 2021, Albom's books had sold over 40 million copies worldwide.
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 Schembechler co-written with the coach.
