Christopher S. Wren papers, 1960-2017

Christopher S. Wren (1936-) was an American journalist, author, and professor. He earned an English degree from Dartmouth College in 1957, where he also studied Russian and participated in the ROTC program. After graduating, he served in the U.S. Army Special Forces as a paratrooper, attaining the rank of captain before continuing his service in the Army National Guard and Army Reserves. Wren later attended the Columbia School of Journalism, launching a career that spanned nearly three decades at The New York Times, where he worked as a reporter, foreign correspondent, and editor. He served as bureau chief in multiple locations, including Moscow, Cairo, Beijing, Ottawa, and Johannesburg, and covered the United Nations. His reporting took him to the former Soviet Union, Eastern Europe, the Middle East, China, Southeast Asia, Africa, and South America. After retiring from The New York Times in 2003, he chronicled his 400-mile journey from Manhattan to Vermont in his book Walking to Vermont. Wren remained active in journalism, working with journalists in Russia and Central Asia, and later taught at Princeton University and Dartmouth College. He also authored several books, including The Cat Who Covered the World, The End of the Line: The Failure of Communism in the Soviet Union and China, and Those Turbulent Sons of Freedom: Ethan Allen’s Green Mountain Boys and the American Revolution.