Jim sheeler biography

Jim Sheeler


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Jim Sheeler has specialized in covering the impact of the war at home for the Rocky Mountain News since the first Colorado casualty of the war in Iraq. He won the 2006 Pulitzer Prize for Feature Writing for his story “Final Salute” and has won numerous other local and national writing awards. Born in Houston, Texas, Sheeler graduated with a degree in journalism from Colorado State University in 1990 and earned a master’s degree in journalism from the University of Colorado in 2007. His book of collected obituaries, Obit: Inspirational Stories of Everyday People Who Led Extraordinary Lives, was published in June 2007.

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Series

Books:

Final Salute, May 2008
Hardcover

James “Jim” Sheeler, a Pulitzer Prize winner for the Rocky Mountain News and journalism teacher who is remembered for his gifts as a deeply empathetic reporter and storyteller, died last week at his home in Chagrin Falls, Ohio. He was 53.

A longtime obituary writer, Sheeler championed war veterans and their families, including Coloradans who were killed in the Iraq War. His 12,000-word article “Final Salute” won the 2006 Pulitzer Prize for feature writing.

The work, hailed by the Pulitzers as a “poignant story on a Marine major who helps the families of comrades killed in Iraq cope with their loss and honor their sacrifice,” was later the basis for a book of the same name, which was a finalist for the 2008 National Book Award for nonfiction.

“Humility, compassion, curiosity — he had all the qualities that you can’t teach,” said Todd Heisler, a photojournalist, colleague and friend, whose own work on “Final Salute” earned him the Pulitzer for feature photography. “He was really a great listener. I thin

He may as well have thrown in a slice of apple pie and a John Deere tractor — Jim Sheeler’s Obit: Inspiring Stores of Ordinary People Who Led Extraordinary Lives is about as American as baseball. His characters exude a down-home goodness that only the midwest has come to know and love, eschewing corporate jobs and urban lifestyles in favor of small towns and agriculture. To the modern, career-driven American, these “ordinary” people may not seem to have much to offer, though Sheeler somehow manages to convince even the most die-hard city-dweller that there is something of great worth in these pages.

But looking at Sheeler’s previous work, this is not surprising. He began his obituary career in Boulder, Colorado, and has since worked his way up to the Obituary Writer’s Hall of Fame, earning him the obscure title of “obituary expert” (in my book, at least). He has contributed to Life on the Death Beat: A Handbook for Obituary Writers, and has also under his belt a Pulitzer Prize for Feature Writing for a story that has its primary

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