Boris Weintraub, a native of Chicago and a graduate of the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University, began his journalism career at the City News Bureau of Chicago, worked as an editor and writer for the Chicago Tribune and the Washington Star, and retired as a senior writer at National Geographic Magazine. He has been free-lancing since 2003 from his Washington, D.C., home, and spends much of the year on the Dingle Peninsula of Ireland.