Lecture by Bay Country Author Tom Horton October 27

SALISBURY, MD--Tom Horton, environmental columnist for The (Baltimore) Sun and author of the award-winning book Bay Country,talks about the State of the Chesapeake Bay in the 21st Century on Wednesday, October 27, at 7 p.m. at Salisbury State University.

Horton's presentation, part of SSU's fall Environmental Lecture Series, is in the Wicomico Room of the Guerrieri University Center. Admission is free and the public is invited.

Horton has worked as a chicken farmer, an Arabic translator, a newspaper reporter and a writer. As a reporter he worked from 1972-1987 for The Sun writing articles mainly about the environment. While working for The Sun he received national awards for reporting from the Amazon and on famine from Africa and the Middle East, and received numerous regional and national awards for environmental coverage of the Chesapeake Bay. These awards included the Scripps Howard Newspapers Meeman Award, the National Wildlife Federations Communication of the Year Award, the Chesapeake Bay Foundation Conservationist of the Year Award and the Sierra Club David Brower Award.

Horton has written five books about the Chesapeake Bay. Bay Country was chosen by the American Library Association as one of the top 40 books published in 1987. Turning the Tide was the first comprehensive assessment of the state of the Chesapeake Bay environment and is widely used as curriculum in the Maryland and Virginia public schools and colleges. His book Swanfall, writtenfor young readers about the ecology and lifecycle of the tundra swan, won the John Burrough's Medal. After living on Smith Island for two years he wrote in 1995 the book Island Out of Time, A Memoir Of Smith Island in the Chesapeake Bay. In 1994 working with photographer David Harp, he wrote Water Way, a coffee table photo book on the Chesapeake.

Horton's lecture is sponsored by the SSU Faculty Cultural Events Committee. For more information contact the Salisbury State University Public Relations Office at 410-543-6030.