Jonathan Coleman was born in 1951 in Allentown, Pennsylvania, lived in New York City, and
currently resides in Charlottesville, Virginia. He was educated at the University of
Virginia. He is a former senior editor in the book publishing industry as well as a former
journalist with CBS News. Coleman taught creative nonfiction writing at the University of
Virginia from 1986 to 1993. His first book, At Mother's
Request, was published in 1985, and his second book, Exit
the Rainmaker, in 1989. He has written for Time,
the New York Times Book Review, The
New Yorker, Newsweek, and other national
publications.
Long Way to Go, published in 1997, uses Milwaukee,
Wisconsin, as a backdrop to explore local and national racial issues. Coleman moved to
Milwaukee and began research in the spring of 1991. He lived in Milwaukee four months and
spent another two years traveling to and from Milwaukee from his Charlottesville home. While
living in Milwaukee and researching Long Way to Go, Coleman
observed firsthand several locally famous racial issues that were included in the book.
These include the smoldering racial tensions of the early 1990s, the appointment of Howard
Fuller as Milwaukee Public Schools Superintendent, the renaming of Victor Berger Elementary
School as Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Elementary School, and the Jeffrey Dahmer case.
