John Hockenberry is the holder of four Emmy awards, four Peabody awards and a whole lot of distinction for his reporting over the years in places as far-flung as Somalia, Iraq, Lebanon, Jerusalem and Tehran.
And he's done all this despite living his life in a wheelchair, as a result of a long-ago car crash.
Hockenberry is co-host of The Takeaway, a daily newsmagazine co-produced by WNYC and Public Radio International, and he'll be in town to speak on Friday at an event for The Whole Person, a group that people with disabilities leading independent lives.
In the first half of Tuesday's Up to Date, Hockenberry joins Steve Kraske to talk about his career and co-hosting a daily news magazine.
HERE MORE: John Hockenberry is the keynote speaker at Friday's The Whole Person Celebration Awards Luncheon at the Kansas City Marriott Downtown. Click here for more information.
The Takeaway marks John Hockenberry's return to his roots in public radio, where he was one of the medium's original innovators after 15 years in network and cable television. During his time at ABC and NBC, he earned four Emmy Awards, three Peabody Awards, an Edward R. Murrow Award, and a Casey Medal. Hockenberry has also been recognized for his pioneering online content, hosts the award-winning public radio series The DNA Files, is a weeky commentator for the series The Infinite Mind and currently sits as a Distinguished Fellow at the prestigious MIT Media Lab. At NBC, he served as a correspondent for Dateline where his work ranged from an intimate portrait of a schizophrenic young adult to an investigative piece that traced internet swindlers in an international web to the first and only interview with the brother of two of the 9/11 suicide hijackers. He also hosted two of his own programs for MSNBC, Hockenberry and Edgewise. Hockenberry was one of the first Western broadcast journalists to report from Kurdish refugee camps in Northern Iraq and Southern Turkey. During the first Gulf War, he reported from Israel, Tunisia, Morocco, Jordan, Turkey, Iraq and Iran. Hockenberry also spent two years as a correspondent based in Jerusalem during the most intensive conflict of the Palestinian uprising. Hockenberry is a contributing editor for Conde Nast Portfolio and Metropolis magazines and has written for The New York Times, The New Yorker, I.D., The Columbia Journalism Review, Details, Wired and The Washington Post. Born in Dayton, Ohio, Hockenberry (@JHockenberry) grew up in upstate New York and Michigan, and attended the University of Chicago and the University of Oregon. He and his wife Alison live in Brooklyn with their two sets of twins, Zoe, Olivia, Zachary and Regan.
