Janny Scott
NationalityAmerican
Alma materHarvard University
Period1977–present
GenreJournalism
Biography
Notable worksA Singular Woman: The Untold Story of Barack Obama's Mother
The Beneficiary: Fortune, Misfortune and the Story of My Father
Notable awardsPulitzer Prize, 2000, for national reporting
SpouseBill Ritter (divorced)
PartnerJoseph Lelyveld (2005–2024, died)
Website
jannyscott.com

Janny Scott (born 1954–1955) is an American journalist and biographer. She won a 2000 Pulitzer Prize for national reporting as part of a New York Times team reporting on race in America.[1]

Family, early life and education

Scott was born to a prosperous blue blood family living outside Philadelphia. Her ancestors included a railroad baron, socialites, a congressman, and a financier. Her grandmother, Hope Montgomery Scott, has been said to be the inspiration Katharine Hepburn's Tracy Lord in the film and play The Philadelphia Story.[2] Her father, Robert Montgomery Scott, was a philanthropist and president of the Philadelphia Museum of Art; a civic leader in Philadelphia, he was called the quintessential Philadelphian.[3] Her maternal grandfather, Colonel Robert L. Montgomery, founded the investment firm Janney Montgomery Scott; her great-grandfather, Thomas A. Scott helped build the Pennsylvania Railroad from a "struggling experiment" into what was then the largest corporation in the world, twice over; another ancestor, Horace Binney, served in Congress.[4]

Scott grew up on Androssan, an 800-acre estate on the Philadelphia Main Line.[4] She lived there until age 14,[1] when her father transplanted the family to England. Her family eventually returned to Androssan to live, but she never did. He had been appointed special assistant to the ambassador to England, Walter Annenberg, a fellow Main Liner. She continued her education at an all-girls boarding school in the countryside.[5]

She attended Harvard University, graduating in 1977, describing her time there as a turning point in her life. She reports that she had "a very good time," finding it "nice to be with men," meeting a different crowd, including radicals, and experiencing the intellectual environment.[5] She began her writing career there "on almost a whim." She wrote for The Harvard Crimson, describing it as her main activity while in school. She also wrote for the The Real Paper, a weekly alternative, and continued writing for it after graduation.[6]

Writing career

Journalism

After 75 rejections from other newspapers, she became a reporter for The Record, in Bergen County, New Jersey. After five years there she landed a job with The Los Angeles Times' San Diego desk. She moved to California; being there was a new experience for her and she loved everything about it. Scott met her husband there, "a surfer—a real Southern California guy." She was later transferred to the Los Angeles office where she covered medicine and politics. Later, with her husband and two children, she moved to New York City and their New York desk. While in New York she left the L.A. Times and joined The New York Times where she worked 14 years (1994–2008)[5] as a reporter on the metropolitan desk,[7] covering race, ideas, class, and demographic changes.[5]

Biographer

On first learning about Barack Obama's mother, Scott felt that the usual representation of her as a "white woman from Kansas" an oversimplification and missed an extraordinary life story. In 2008 she took a leave from The Times to write a fuller story. The resulting 200 interviews and two and a half led to the publication of A Singular Woman: The Untold Story of Barack Obama's Mother.[8] The book was a bestseller, runner up for the 2012 PEN/Jacqueline Bograd Weld Award for Biography, and one of Time Magazine's top ten of nonfiction books for 2011.[9][10]

Her second book, The Beneficiary: Fortune, Misfortune and the Story of My Father explored secret family legacies. Scott inherited her father's diaries when he died of alcoholic cirrhosis in 2005. She lays bare her family history of suicide, generations of alcoholism, extramarital affairs, absent parents and her own father's struggle with alcoholism and depression;[2] and, how her father was trapped by the "emotional heft"[11] of his inheritance.[12] She is saddened by her father's only feeble attempts to deal with alcohol and depression; and, his lack of forthrightness in discussing these problems with the family. She is less saddened by his infidelity, which was common in the family. She notes that fidelity in a long marriage is not for everybody; she views infidelity not as a character flaw, but as a character fact.[5] The book was a New York Times notable book of 2019[13] and was on NPR's best books of 2019 list.[14]

Personal

Scott was married to Bill Ritter, a television news anchor. They were together for 19 years and had two children. In 2005, while married, a relationship between Scott and Joseph Lelyveld, former executive editor of The New York Times, became public.[7] Scott was his partner for 19 years until his death in 2024.[15]

References

  1. 1 2 Gorra, Michael (2019-04-19). "His Children Called Him the Duke of Villanova. But Who Really Was He?". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2024-01-07.
  2. 1 2 "Janny Scott: Secrets and stories of a prosperous family". WHYY. Retrieved 2024-01-07.
  3. ↑ "Collection: Robert Montgomery Scott Records | Philadelphia Museum of Art Archives". pmalibrary.libraryhost.com. Retrieved 2024-01-09.
  4. 1 2 "'The Beneficiary' by Janny Scott". Broad Street Review. 2020-08-31. Retrieved 2024-01-09.
  5. 1 2 3 4 5 Jacobs, Melissa (2019-05-22). "'The Beneficiary' Offers an Intimate Look at Life Inside Ardrossan". Main Line Today. Retrieved 2024-01-08.
  6. ↑ "Single woman's biographer". Harvard Crimson.
  7. 1 2 Staff, W. W. D. (2005-04-08). "Memo Pad: Unintended Outing … Awfully Prada Her … Way Down South …". WWD. Retrieved 2024-01-08.
  8. ↑ Reeve, Elspeth (2011-04-20). "The Real Story of Obama's Mom". The Atlantic. Retrieved 2024-01-08.
  9. ↑ "A Singular Woman: The Untold Story of Barack Obama's Mo…". Goodreads. Retrieved 2024-01-08.
  10. ↑ Noble, Barnes &. "Time Magazine's Top 10 Nonfiction Books of 2011, Time Magazine's Best Books of 2011, Books". Barnes & Noble. Retrieved 2024-01-09.
  11. ↑ "The Benficiary weighs the emotional heft of inheritance". National Public radio. Retrieved 2024-01-08.
  12. ↑ Hulbert, Ann (2019-04-20). "A Gilded Cage". The Atlantic. Retrieved 2024-01-08.
  13. ↑ "New York Times 100 Notable Books of 2019 (100 books)". www.goodreads.com. Retrieved 2024-01-09.
  14. ↑ "Books We Love". NPR. Retrieved 2024-01-09.
  15. ↑ "Joseph Lelyveld, Former Top Editor of The New York Times, Dies at 86". The New York Times.
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