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Tom Verde

I started writing professionally in 1983 out on Block Island, RI as a cub reporter (make that the only reporter) for The Block Island Times. I didn't know what I was doing, but I learned fast -- especially about town government and civics -- by covering town meetings, zoning board meetings, school committee meetings, etc. etc. all the while tending bar and working construction on the island year-round. It was the best education a budding journalist could get. From there I migrated to papers on Nantucket and Long Island before I ended up in Maine where I started freelancing for the Boston Globe, Down East magazine, Yankee, the Maine Public Broadcasting Network (and thereby NPR). While in Maine I researched and wrote a book of true ghost stor I started writing professionally in 1983 out on Block Island, RI as a cub reporter (make that the only reporter) for The Block Island Times. I didn't know what I was doing, but I learned fast -- especially about town government and civics -- by covering town meetings, zoning board meetings, school committee meetings, etc. etc. all the while tending bar and working construction on the island year-round. It was the best education a budding journalist could get. From there I migrated to papers on Nantucket and Long Island before I ended up in Maine where I started freelancing for the Boston Globe, Down East magazine, Yankee, the Maine Public Broadcasting Network (and thereby NPR). While in Maine I researched and wrote a book of true ghost stories, published by Down East Books in 1989 (2nd edition 2013). I eventually moved to Boston where I continued to write for the Globe and public radio, working as a permanent fill-in Exec Producer at WBUR. When the Executive Producer of the business show Marketplace -- for whom I regularly filed stories -- started a radio travel show called the Savvy Traveler, I jumped at the chance to become a regular correspondent and traveled throughout Africa, Europe and the Middle East for the show. It was in the Middle East where I developed an interest in the history of Islam and its relations with the West which led me to start writing for AramcoWorld magazine, where I am now a senior contributor. I also developed an interest in the shared histories of the Abrahamic faiths (Judaism, Christianity, and Islam) and attended Hartford Seminary where I earned a Masters Degree in Islamic Studies and Christian-Muslim Relations in 2009. I went on to teach Christian theology at an independent school in Jordan before returning to the United States where I continued to write about food, history, culture and lifestyle for AramcoWorld, the New York Times, Politico, Religion News Service, and other outlets. My interest in local New England history led me to writing a column for the Westerly Sun newspaper from 2014 to 2015 on unique and historic boats in the region. In 2020 I gathered together a lot of those columns and published them in a book, In A Class All Their Own: Unique and Historic Boats of New England (Globe Pequot Press).

I like to cook (I make my own bread, and have a wood-fired pizza oven in my kitchen)

I love to hike in the woods of southern RI, home to thousands of acres of open space

As Dorothy Parker once said, "I hate writing, but I love having written." ...more