Author Archives: Doug Cumming

A friend sent us the invitation from the White House to share our story about Obamacare. I was glad to do so, below. Obamacare: Share Your Story http://www.whitehouse.gov Obamacare has led to higher costs and fewer health insurance options for … Continue reading →

Objectivity is not neutrality, as historian Thomas L. Haskell puts it. In my years as a news reporter in the last quarter of the 20th century, journalistic objectivity was not stenography either. For us, it involved moving around, hanging out … Continue reading →

A letter to my parish church, Feb. 28. “Suppose one of you wants to build a tower. Will he not first sit down and estimate the cost to see if he has enough money to complete it? For if he … Continue reading →

Southerners are said to be obsessed with their own history. It’s true, belying that old dictum that history is always written by the winners. Even now, well into the 21st century, I find myself wading into the murky waters of … Continue reading →

For Pam I was just beginning, in that clammy August, to pick up the riff of the teaching gig when I flew from New Orleans off to Miami, the two U.S. cities we journalists dig. It felt like betrayal of … Continue reading →

The American South isn’t the only place where heritage groups claim a particular day to wave their flags. When I was in Northern Ireland a few years ago, a nervous public waited to see whether the traditional July 12 parades … Continue reading →

Another semester is ending. It always feels a little messy, like cleaning up a gymnasium after a big dance party during which (you remember) some things happened you wish had not happened. But several of my students have sent me … Continue reading →

In the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Dec. 1, 2016: Emily Wright Cumming, a multi-talented, dynamic fourth-generation Atlantan, died Nov. 27 at age 90 after a brief illness. She is survived by her husband of 68 years, Joseph B. Cumming, Jr.; four children; … Continue reading →

My friend and mentor, poet Stephen Sandy, died last week in Bennington, Vt., at 82. I learned this in an email announcement from Bennington College. That’s where he taught when he became my literature teacher, adviser and senior-thesis tutor. Although … Continue reading →

Why is it, I asked Daddy, that we two writers, with such rich material to work with, have never made fiction out of our family? Pat Conroy did it with his family. Yeah, he said, and it wasn’t very nice … Continue reading →