Jonathan Franklin (born 6 September 1964) is an American book author, investigative journalist and TV commentator on

Latin America Latin America or * french: Amérique Latine, link=no * ht, Amerik Latin, link=no * pt, América Latina, link=no, name=a, sometimes referred to as LatAm is a large cultural region in the Americas where Romance languages — languages derived f ...

n politics and news.

Biography

Franklin was born in Manchester, New Hampshire, and raised in

Lincoln, Massachusetts Lincoln is a town in Middlesex County, Massachusetts. The population was 7,014 according to the 2020 United States Census, including residents of Hanscom Air Force Base that live within town limits. The town, located in the MetroWest region o ...

, where he graduated from

Lincoln-Sudbury Regional High School Lincoln-Sudbury Regional High School (LSRHS or L-S) is a public regional high school in Sudbury, Massachusetts, with a 99% graduation-rate. The school was founded in 1954, and the building was replaced prior to the 2004–2005 academic year, wit ...

. Franklin attended

Brown University Brown University is a private research university in Providence, Rhode Island. Brown is the seventh-oldest institution of higher education in the United States, founded in 1764 as the College in the English Colony of Rhode Island and Providenc ...

Providence, Rhode Island Providence is the capital and most populous city of the U.S. state of Rhode Island. One of the oldest cities in New England, it was founded in 1636 by Roger Williams, a Reformed Baptist theologian and religious exile from the Massachusetts Bay ...

, from 1983–1988. Since 1995, Franklin has lived and worked in

South America South America is a continent entirely in the Western Hemisphere and mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a relatively small portion in the Northern Hemisphere at the northern tip of the continent. It can also be described as the southe ...

with his wife and daughters, based in

Santiago Santiago (, ; ), also known as Santiago de Chile, is the capital and largest city of Chile as well as one of the largest cities in the Americas. It is the center of Chile's most densely populated region, the Santiago Metropolitan Region, whose ...

Chile Chile, officially the Republic of Chile, is a country in the western part of South America. It is the southernmost country in the world, and the closest to Antarctica, occupying a long and narrow strip of land between the Andes to the east a ...

Career

After graduation he worked as a news clerk at ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

'' in

Manhattan Manhattan (), known regionally as the City, is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the five boroughs of New York City. The borough is also coextensive with New York County, one of the original counties of the U.S. state ...

. From 1990 to 1995 Franklin lived in

San Francisco San Francisco (; Spanish language, Spanish for "Francis of Assisi, Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the List of Ca ...

and worked as a

reporter A journalist is an individual that collects/gathers information in form of text, audio, or pictures, processes them into a news-worthy form, and disseminates it to the public. The act or process mainly done by the journalist is called journalism ...

for the ''

San Francisco Bay Guardian The ''San Francisco Bay Guardian'' was a free alternative newspaper published weekly in San Francisco, California. It was founded in 1966 by Bruce B. Brugmann and his wife, Jean Dibble. The paper was shut down on October 14, 2014. It was relaun ...

'' and ''

SF Weekly ''SF Weekly'' was a free alternative weekly newspaper founded in the 1970s in San Francisco, California. It was distributed every Thursday, and was published by the San Francisco Print Media Company. The paper has won national journalism awards, ...

'' as well as ''

The Boston Globe ''The Boston Globe'' is an American daily newspaper founded and based in Boston, Massachusetts. The newspaper has won a total of 27 Pulitzer Prizes, and has a total circulation of close to 300,000 print and digital subscribers. ''The Boston Glob ...

''. As a reporter for ''

Playboy ''Playboy'' is an American men's lifestyle and entertainment magazine, formerly in print and currently online. It was founded in Chicago in 1953, by Hugh Hefner and his associates, and funded in part by a $1,000 loan from Hefner's mother. K ...

'' magazine in the early 1990s, Franklin interviewed prominent figures in the United States, including Patrick Buchanan and Timothy McVeigh. His work is regularly published by ''Playboy'', '' GQ'', ''

Esquire Esquire (, ; abbreviated Esq.) is usually a courtesy title. In the United Kingdom, ''esquire'' historically was a title of respect accorded to men of higher social rank, particularly members of the landed gentry above the rank of gentlema ...

'', ''

Marie Claire ''Marie Claire'' is a French international monthly magazine first published in France in 1937, followed by the United Kingdom in 1941. Since then various editions are published in many countries and languages. The feature editions focus on wo ...

'' and other magazines around the world. Franklin is co-founder of Addictvillage, a news and media agency based in Chile. Through Addictvillage Jonathan has written adventure news stories from Latin America, about topics ranging from U.S deportation of

illegal immigrants Illegal immigration is the migration of people into a country in violation of the immigration laws of that country or the continued residence without the legal right to live in that country. Illegal immigration tends to be financially upwa ...

to hidden

cocaine Cocaine (from , from , ultimately from Quechuan languages, Quechua: ''kúka'') is a central nervous system (CNS) stimulant mainly recreational drug use, used recreationally for its euphoria, euphoric effects. It is primarily obtained from t ...

labs in the

Colombia Colombia (, ; ), officially the Republic of Colombia, is a country in South America with insular regions in North America—near Nicaragua's Caribbean coast—as well as in the Pacific Ocean. The Colombian mainland is bordered by the Car ...

n jungle to "eco barons" in Chile. In 2011 Franklin published a book about the

2010 Copiapó mining accident The 2010 Copiapó mining accident, also known then as the "Chilean mining accident", began on 5 August 2010, with a cave-in at the San José copper–gold mine, located in the Atacama Desert north of the regional capital of Copiapó, in nort ...

called ''33 Men: Inside the Miraculous Survival and Dramatic Rescue of the Chilean Miners''. During the accident, he reported extensively from the San Jose mine for ''

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers ''The Observer'' and ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the Gu ...

'' and ''

The Washington Post ''The Washington Post'' (also known as the ''Post'' and, informally, ''WaPo'') is an American daily newspaper published in Washington, D.C. It is the most widely circulated newspaper within the Washington metropolitan area and has a large nati ...

''. Franklin's experiences and insider accounts became the basis of a ''60 Minutes'' TV program about the miners, an article in ''People'' magazine, and a series of audio lectures on the BBC. Franklin says, "While 2,000 journalists were locked behind police lines, my 'Rescue Team' pass enabled me to experience up close the final six weeks of this miracle rescue. It was my honor to watch the drama unfold in its many moments of beauty and courage and comedy; and to see, first-hand, the profound unity that made this operation succeed." In 2015, he published ''438 Days: An Extraordinary True Story of Survival at Sea'', based on the account of

José Salvador Alvarenga José Salvador Alvarenga (; born ) is a Salvadoran fisherman and author who was found on January 30, 2014, aged 36 or 37, on the Marshall Islands after spending 14 months adrift in a fishing boat in the Pacific Ocean beginning on November 17, 201 ...

, the Salvadoran fisherman who spent 14 months adrift in the Pacific Ocean. In 2021, he published ''A Wild Idea'', a biography of the American

Douglas Tompkins Douglas Rainsford Tompkins (March 20, 1943 – December 8, 2015) was an American businessman, conservation movement, conservationist, outdoorsman, philanthropist, filmmaker, and agriculturalist. He co-founded the North Face Inc, Esprit and vario ...

who founded

The North Face The North Face is an American outdoor recreation products company. The North Face produces outdoor clothing, footwear, and related equipment. Founded in 1968 to supply climbers, the company's logo draws inspiration from Half Dome, in Yosemite ...

and

Esprit Esprit or L'Esprit may refer to: * the French for Spirit; as a loanword: ** Enthusiasm, intense interest or motivation ** Morale, motivation and readiness ** Geist "mind/spirit; intellect" * Esprit (name), a given name and surname * ''Esprit'' (m ...

clothing company, who then moved to Chile and bought up large tracts of land in Patagonia for conservation. In 2022, Franklin and co-author Michael Smith published ''Cabin Fever: The Harrowing Journey of a Cruise Ship at the Dawn of a Pandemic'' about the Holland-America cruise ship MS ''Zaandam'' during the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic as it sought a friendly port from the tip of South America to Miami Florida.

References

External links

* http://JonathanFranklin.com {{DEFAULTSORT:Franklin, Jonathan American male journalists Brown University alumni Living people 1964 births People from Lincoln, Massachusetts Lincoln-Sudbury Regional High School alumni