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Jeffrey Zaslow Died

February 12, 2012 by · Comments Off on Jeffrey Zaslow Died 

Jeffrey Zaslow Died, Jeffrey Zaslow, 53, a Broomall native who became a best-selling author and Wall Street Journal columnist, died in a car accident Friday in Michigan, where he lived. Mr. Zaslow wrote The Last Lecture, about Carnegie Mellon University professor Randy Pausch, who became famous for a lecture – delivered while he was battling pancreatic cancer – about achieving childhood dreams. The book rose to No. 1 on the New York Times best-seller list.

Mr. Zaslow also cowrote Gabby: A Story of Courage and Hope with former U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, who is recovering from being shot in the head last year, and her husband, Capt. Mark Kelly, the space shuttle pilot.

“I write about ‘matters of the heart’ for people of all ages,” he said during an appearance at the Marple Public Library in 2010, according to an article on the Delaware County News Network website.

Mr. Zaslow graduated from Marple Newtown High School and, in 1980, from Carnegie Mellon in Pittsburgh.

The Journal, which reported Mr. Zaslow’s death, said he was a reporter at the newspaper from 1983 until 1987, when he won a national competition to replace the advice columnist Ann Landers at the Chicago Sun-Times after she moved to the rival Tribune. He later returned to the Journal. In 2003 and 2005, he was named best columnist at a large newspaper by the National Society of Newspaper Columnists.

Mr. Zaslow coauthored Highest Duty: My Search for What Really Matters, the memoir of Capt. Chesley “Sully” Sullenberger, who became a national hero when he landed a US Airways flight in the Hudson River.

He wrote The Girls From Ames: A Story of Women and Friendship and, most recently, The Magic Room: A Story About the Love We Wish for Our Daughters.

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