The Reading Life

Peter Bollen, born in March 24, 1948 in Lynn, MA, and raised there, has lived in Bridgton, Maine since 2003. He served in the U.S. Navy from 1968 to 1970, and attended North Shore Community College in Beverly, MA. He was editor of the Lynnfield Beacon (MA), a trade labor journal, in 1989, and editor of The Northeast News Service (MA) from 1989-1996 (editor emeritus since 1996). He has published occasional essays in newspapers including the Daily Item (Lynn, MA), the North Shore Sunday (Danvers, MA), the Salem Evening News (MA), and The Bridgton News (ME), an;d Lake Living Magazine (ME). Bollen initiated a lawsuit -- eventually joined by more than a dozen plaintiffs -- against the Justice Dept. to overturn a prohibition on compensation for freelance writing and speaking for all federal employees; the U.S. Supreme Court agreed and overturned the ban in 1995. He contributed a biography of folk artist Woody Guthrie to the Postmaster General (1980), which helped result in a commemorative postage stamp of Guthrie as part of the Folk Musicians series.