Mary A. Shafer's Resumé

Read Mary's Biography.

Awards & Memberships

• 2006 – Devastation on the Delaware named Notable Reference Book by Writers Notes Magazine in their Annual Book Awards.
• 2006 – Devastation on the Delaware garners runner-up status in Regional History and Nature Writing categories of USABookNews.com Annual Book Awards.
• 1995 – Winner: Best Book In One or Two Colors, Mid America Publishers Assn.
• 1998 – Honorable Mention, Potomac Review Annual Short Story/Essay Contest.
• Member – The Authors Guild
• Member – Pennsylvania Heritage Society
• Member – National Museum of Women in History
• Member – Civil War Preservation Trust

Employment History

The Word Forge
Ferndale, PA 2/97-Present
Freelance communications. Marketing: concepts, headlines & copywriting for print & new media; writing & editing press releases, publicity features, profiles, newsletters, direct mail; ghostwriting for business letters, speeches, books, manuals.

Rhino Tactics
Buckingham, PA 3/99- 6/02
Creative director, copywriter and project manager for construction-specific advertising and marketing agency. Also created sales proposals and presentations.

Community School
New Hope-Solebury, PA 3/99-12/00
Instructor, adult writing courses.

The Art Emporium
Milwaukee, WI 5/90-2/97
Owner/operator of full line freelance communications studio. Original copywriting and editing for print advertising media, public relations and publicity services.

Milwaukee Area Technical College
Milwaukee, WI 8/94-12/96
Instructor, advertising layout and copywriting.

Trade Press, Inc.
Glendale, WI 3/94-9/94
Magazine publisher/service bureau. Concept and writing of sell copy and headlines for trade ads and collateral print.

NorthWord Press/Lost River Press
Minocqua, WI 2/90-12/93
Interim manuscript editor/proofreader for nature book publishers. Wrote sell copy for catalogs, book covers/flaps, trade and consumer ads, promotional materials.
Production manager, publicist duties.

Shafer Design
Milwaukee, WI 1/84-2/90
Copywriting for direct mail and collateral print sales materials.

South Side Spirit
Milwaukee, WI 10/83-9/86
Newspaper reporter. Straight news, features, headlines and ad copy.

Education

Skillpath Seminars
Allentown, PA 11/99
Writing for the Web

Milwaukee Area Technical College
Milwaukee, WI 8/87-5/90
Associate of Applied Science in Commercial Art. Honors graduate, 3.99 GPA.

University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee
Milwaukee, WI Spring 1981
Commercial art, English literature concentration.
3.54 GPA.

University of Wisconsin-Stout
Menomonee, WI 1/80-12/80
Studio art, English/History minors. 3.74 GPA.

Menomonee Falls East High School
Milwaukee, WI Spring 1979
Newspaper layout editor, reporter. Quill & Scroll Society, National Honor Society.

Personal

Avid reader, history buff, nature appreciator. Hobbies: blacksmithing, furniture refinishing, woodcarving, genealogy, oil painting, music.

Author of: Devastation on the Delaware: Stories and Images of the Flood of 1955; Wisconsin: The Way We Were (Heartland Press, 1993); Rural America: A Pictorial Folk Memory (Willow Creek Press, 1995)