 |
Geoffrey Gray | |
|---|---|
 Gray in 2015 | |
| Born | February 19, 1979 Binghamton, New York, U.S. |
| Occupation(s) | Author, producer, journalist |
| Employer | New York magazine |
Geoffrey Gray (born February 19, 1979) is an American author, documentary producer, and journalist. He is a contributing editor at New York magazine. [1]
Gray was born in Binghamton, New York. He attended Northfield Mount Hermon School, and also studied in Alexandria, Egypt. In 1997, he enrolled at the University of Rochester and later dropped out to move to New York City and pursue a career in journalism.[ citation needed ]
He published his first essay for The New York Times . [2] He worked there until moving to the Village Voice , where he investigated poverty pimps, and cases against the wrongfully accused. [3] In 2003, Gray began covering boxing for the New York Times, writing about underdogs in their industries, laborers and legends like Mike Tyson. [4] . [5] Two years later, Gray started work at the New York City Police Department headquarters, covering the crime beat for the New York Sun . In 2006, he became a staff writer and later contributing editor at New York magazine.
Gray is known for his eccentric choice of subjects, profiling a tour bus driver that also served as a Nigerian king, the world’s most daring fragrance expert, and the world’s most gored matador. [6] [7] [8] Gray’s interest in underdogs is a common theme in his works. In 2008, he produced and narrated a segment of the Showtime series This American Life , which featured a pair of troubled boxers in Tennessee. [9]
His work has appeared in the New York Times Magazine , Sports Illustrated , ESPN: The Magazine , and Departures. [10] [11] [12] He has also been featured as an expert on Good Morning America , NBC Today and CNN. [13] [14] Gray lives in New York City. Gray is also the founder of True.Ink, an interactive magazine devoted to expertise and adventure.
In 2011, Gray published his first book, Skyjack: The Hunt for D.B Cooper, based on the infamous D. B. Cooper case and on thousands of confidential case files. The book made The New York Times Best Seller list after the first week of publication. Gay Talese called the book "a delectable adventure from a talented new author." [15]
In 2013, Gray produced a feature film, Patrolman P, a documentary about a legendary and corrupt police detective in the 1970s. It premiered in New York City. [16] [17]
D. B. Cooper was an unidentified man who hijacked Northwest Orient Airlines Flight 305, a Boeing 727 aircraft, in United States airspace on November 24, 1971. During the flight from Portland, Oregon, to Seattle, Washington, the hijacker told a flight attendant he had a bomb, demanded $200,000 in ransom, and requested four parachutes upon landing in Seattle. After releasing the passengers in Seattle, the hijacker instructed the flight crew to refuel the aircraft and begin a second flight to Mexico City, with a refueling stop in Reno, Nevada. About 30 minutes after taking off from Seattle, the hijacker opened the aircraft's aft door, deployed the staircase, and parachuted into the night over southwestern Washington. The hijacker has never been found or identified conclusively.
Michael Gerard Tyson is an American professional boxer who competed from 1985 to 2005, and is scheduled to compete once again in 2024. Nicknamed "Iron Mike" and "Kid Dynamite" in his early career, and later known as "The Baddest Man on the Planet", Tyson is regarded as one of the greatest heavyweight boxers of all time. He reigned as the undisputed world heavyweight champion from 1987 to 1990. Tyson won his first 19 professional fights by knockout, 12 of them in the first round. Claiming his first belt at 20 years, 4 months, and 22 days old, Tyson holds the record as the youngest boxer ever to win a heavyweight title. He was the first heavyweight boxer to simultaneously hold the WBA, WBC and IBF titles, as well as the only heavyweight to unify them in succession. The following year, Tyson became the lineal champion when he knocked out Michael Spinks in 91 seconds of the first round. In 1990, Tyson was knocked out by underdog Buster Douglas in one of the biggest upsets in boxing history.
Emile Alphonse Griffith was an American professional boxer who won world titles in three weight divisions. He held the world light middleweight, undisputed welterweight, and middleweight titles. His best-known contest was a 1962 title match with Benny Paret. Griffith won the bout by knockout; Paret never recovered consciousness and died in the hospital 10 days later.
Donald King is an American boxing promoter, known for his involvement in several historic boxing matchups.
Evander Holyfield is an American former professional boxer who competed between 1984 and 2011. He reigned as the undisputed champion at cruiserweight in the late 1980s and at heavyweight in the early 1990s, and was the only boxer in history to win the undisputed championship in two weight classes in the "three belt era", a feat later surpassed by Terence Crawford, Naoya Inoue and Oleksandr Usyk, who became two-weight undisputed champions in the four-belt era. Nicknamed "the Real Deal", Holyfield is the only four-time world heavyweight champion, having held the unified WBA, WBC, and IBF titles from 1990 to 1992, the WBA and IBF titles again from 1993 to 1994, the WBA title a third time from 1996 to 1999; the IBF title a third time from 1997 to 1999 and the WBA title for a fourth time from 2000 to 2001.
Floyd Patterson was an American professional boxer who competed from 1952 to 1972, and twice reigned as the world heavyweight champion between 1956 and 1962. At the age of 21, he became the youngest boxer in history to win the title, and was also the first heavyweight to regain the title after losing it. As an amateur, he won a gold medal in the middleweight division at the 1952 Summer Olympics. He is recognised as one of the best heavyweights of all time.
Gaetano "Gay" Talese is an American writer. As a journalist for The New York Times and Esquire magazine during the 1960s, Talese helped to define contemporary literary journalism and is considered, along with Tom Wolfe, Joan Didion, and Hunter S. Thompson, one of the pioneers of New Journalism. Talese's most famous articles are about Joe DiMaggio and Frank Sinatra.
Tyrell Biggs is an American former professional boxer who competed from 1984 to 1998, and challenged once for the undisputed heavyweight title in 1987. As an amateur he won a gold medal at the 1984 Summer Olympics, having previously won bronze at the 1983 Pan American Games and gold at the 1982 World Championships, all in the super heavyweight division.
Constantine "Cus" D'Amato was an American boxing manager and trainer who handled the careers of Mike Tyson, Floyd Patterson, and José Torres, all of whom went on to be inducted into the International Boxing Hall of Fame. Several successful boxing trainers, including Teddy Atlas and Kevin Rooney, were tutored by D'Amato. He was a proponent of the peek-a-boo style of boxing, in which the fighter holds his gloves close to his cheeks and pulls his arms tight against his torso, which was criticized by some because it was believed that an efficient attack could not be launched from it.
Bruce Samuel Seldon is an American former professional boxer and current boxing trainer, who competed from 1988 to 1996, and 2004 to 2009. He held the WBA heavyweight title from 1995 to 1996, most notably losing to Mike Tyson via knockout in his second defense.
Jim Gray is an American sportscaster. As of 2021, he is with Showtime, Fox and SiriusXM as a reporter, commentator, and interviewer, having served in the same capacity at ESPN, NBC Sports and CBS Sports.
Donovan "Razor" Ruddock is a Jamaican-born Canadian former professional boxer who competed from 1982 to 2001 and in 2015. He is known for his two fights against Mike Tyson in 1991, a fight against Lennox Lewis in 1992, and a fight with Tommy Morrison in 1995. Ruddock was also known for his exceptionally heavy punching; some of the best examples of his left hand and overall power was his knockouts of former WBA heavyweight champions James Smith in 1989, Michael Dokes in 1990, and Greg Page in 1992. His favoured weapon at the ring proved to be a highly versatile half-hook, half-uppercut left-handed punch he called "The Smash" which accounted for the majority of his knockout wins -- it also happened to be his major downside throughout his career. Being a left-handed puncher fighting out of the orthodox stance, he didn't throw right handed punchs during most knockout flurries.
Lee Savold was an American heavyweight boxer who held the British and European (EBU) version of the World Heavyweight championship between 1950 and 1951 and was a leading contender in the 1940s and early 1950s. During his career he fought storied Heavyweight Champions Joe Louis and Rocky Marciano. Savold was inducted into the Minnesota Boxing Hall of Fame in 2012.
Nan Talese is a retired American editor, and a veteran of the New York publishing industry. Talese was the senior vice president of Doubleday. From 1990 to 2020, Talese was the publisher and editorial director of her own imprint, Nan A. Talese/Doubleday, publishing authors such as Pat Conroy, Ian McEwan, and Peter Ackroyd.
The Kingdom and the Power: Behind the Scenes at The New York Times: The Institution That Influences the World is a 1969 book by Gay Talese about the inner workings of The New York Times, the newspaper where Talese had worked for 12 years. The book was originally subtitled "The Story of The Men Who Influence The Institution That Influences the World." The book is credited with starting the trend of "media books" as noted by Portfolio at the New York University School of Journalism, books that "portraying the inner-workings of a media establishment, turning the tables on the people who write and report the news, and making them the subject."
D. B. Cooper is a media epithet used to describe an unidentified man who hijacked a Boeing 727 on November 24, 1971, extorted a US$200,000 ransom, and parachuted to an unknown fate. He was never seen again, and only $5,880 of the ransom money has been found. The incident continues to influence popular culture, and has inspired references in books, film, and music.
Tyson is a 1995 American biographical drama television film based on the life of American heavyweight boxer Iron Mike Tyson. Directed by Uli Edel and written by Robert Johnson, it stars Michael Jai White as Tyson alongside George C. Scott as Cus D'Amato and Paul Winfield as Don King. The film is an adaptation of the 1989 biography Fire and Fear: The Inside Story of Iron Mike Tyson by José Torres, a former boxer and former chairman of the New York State Athletic Commission, and depicts events from Tyson's troubled childhood in Brooklyn through his conviction in 1992 for the rape of beauty pageant contestant Desiree Washington.
The Last Master Outlaw: How He Outfoxed the FBI Six Times—but Not a Cold Case Team is a 2016 non-fiction book written by Thomas J. Colbert and Tom Szollosi. It details the results of a five-year investigation of a suspect in the 1971 D. B. Cooper hijacking case. The book documents the life of Robert Rackstraw and the evidence compiled against him. It was also the basis of the 2016 History Channel documentary D.B. Cooper: Case Closed.
The apparent success and instant notoriety of the hijacker known as D. B. Cooper in November 1971 resulted in over a dozen copycat hijackings within the next year all using a similar template to that established by Cooper. Like Cooper, the plan would be to hijack an aircraft, demand a ransom, and then parachute from that aircraft as a method of escape. To combat this wave of extortion hijackings, aircraft were fitted with eponymous "Cooper Vanes," specifically designed to prevent the aft staircase from being lowered in-flight. The Cooper Vane, as well as the widespread implementation of other safety measures such as the installation of metal detectors throughout American airports, would spell the end of the Cooper copycats.
D.B. Cooper: Where Are You?! is a four-part documentary mini-series released by Netflix in 2022. The series discusses the history and investigation of the Northwest Orient Airlines hijacking by the man known as D. B. Cooper in 1971 and includes interviews with investigators and journalists involved with investigating the case.
