Schwarz, Ted 1945–

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Schwarz, Ted 1945–

(Theodore R. Schwarz, Jr.)

PERSONAL: Born October 12, 1945, in Cleveland, OH; son of Theodore R. (a salesman) and Ruth Dorothy (a home economist) Schwarz; married Nancy Leigh Clark (a civil servant), December 17, 1966 (divorced, 1978); married Leslie Carroll (a bookkeeper), August 17, 1979; children: Raheem Thomas, Lawrence Dumaush, William Demarius. Education: Attended Case Western Reserve University, 1964–66, 1971, New York Institute of Photography, 1965, and University of the South School of Theology, 1992–95. Politics: Democrat. Religion: Episcopalian. Hobbies and other interests: Numismatics, reading, walking, theology.

ADDRESSES: Home—Cleveland, OH.

CAREER: Writer, journalist, photographer, ghostwriter, and educator. Freelance writer, 1963–. National Broadcasting Company (NBC), radio writer, 1966; Storer Broadcasting Co., radio writer, 1966–74; Westing-house Broadcasting Co., radio writer, 1967–70; Akron Beacon Journal, Akron, OH, reporter, 1967–68, general assignment reporter, 1968–69; Communication Unlimited, commercial photographer, 1968–80; freelance commercial photographer, 1969–73; Newspaper Enterprise Association, Cleveland, OH, writer, 1970–71. Pima College, instructor in writing, 1976–87; Yavapi College, instructor in writing, 1982–87; Northern Arizona University, adjunct professor, 1984–87; Writer's Digest School, instructor, 1986. Founder, Write On, Cleveland!, East Cleveland Public Library, 1992. Worked as heart research technician at Akron City Hospital, as an alternative to military service, 1966–67.

MEMBER: Authors Guild, Authors League of America, Writers Guild of America West, Numismatic Literary Guild, Mystery Writers of America.

AWARDS, HONORS: Medal of excellence for writing and teaching, Charles H. Mason University, 1992.

WRITINGS:

Coins as Living History, Arco (New York, NY), 1976.

The Successful Promoter, Regnery (Chicago, IL), 1977.

(With Henry Hawksworth) The Five of Me, Regnery (Chicago, IL), 1977.

(With Christina Peters) Tell Me Who I Am before I Die, Rawson Associates (New York, NY), 1978.

(With Ralph Allison) Minds in Many Pieces: The Making of a Very Special Doctor, Rawson Associates (New York, NY), 1980, reprinted as Minds in Many Pieces: Revealing the Spiritual Side of Multiple Personality Disorder, CIE Publishers (Los Osos, CA), 1999.

Beginner's Guide to Coin Collecting, Doubleday (New York, NY), 1980.

A History of United States Coinage, A.S. Barnes (San Diego, CA), 1981.

The Hillside Strangler, Doubleday (Garden City, NY), 1981, reprinted as The Hillside Strangler: The Three Faces of America's Most Savage Rapist and Murderer and the Shocking Revelations from the Sensational Los Angeles Trial!, Quill Driver Books/Word Dancer Press (Sanger, CA), 2004.

How to Protect Yourself, Your Home, and Your Family, Arco (New York, NY), 1983.

Beginner's Guide to Stamp Collecting, Arco (New York, NY), 1983.

Arnold Friberg: The Passion of a Modern Master, Northland Press (Flagstaff, AZ), 1985.

(With John DeLorean) DeLorean, Zondervan (Grand Rapids, MI), 1985.

(With Parichehr Yomtoob) The Gift of Life, St. Martin's (New York, NY), 1985.

(With Rosemary Tweet) Parent Education: A Guide for Family Enrichment Classes, Discipleship Resources (Nashville, TN), 1987.

(Ghostwriter for Florence Henderson) A Little Cooking, a Little Talking, and a Whole Lot of Fun with Florence Henderson and Friends from Her Krazy Kountry Kitchen, Panorama (Van Nuys, CA), 1988.

(With Duane Empey) That Other Church down Your Block, Zondervan (Grand Rapids, MI), 1988.

Time Management for Writers, Writer's Digest (Cincinnati, OH), 1988.

(With Duane Empey) Satanism: Is Your Family Safe?, Zondervan (Grand Rapids, MI), 1988.

(With Allen Friedman) Power and Greed: Inside the Teamsters Empire of Corruption, Watts (New York, NY), 1989.

The Complete Guide to Writing Biographies, Writer's Digest (Cincinnati, OH), 1990.

(With Joyce Lukezic) False Arrest: The Joyce Lukezic Story, New Horizon Press (Far Hills, NJ), 1990.

(With Leslie McRay) Kept Women: Confessions from a Life of Luxury, Morrow (New York, NY), 1990.

(With Sherry Clayton Taggett) Paintbrushes and Pistols: How the Taos Artists Sold the West, J. Muir Publications (Santa Fe, NM), 1990.

Deadly Whispers (biography), St. Martin's Press (New York, NY), 1992.

Walking with the Damned: The Shocking Murder of the Man Who Freed 30,000 Prisoners from the Nazis, Paragon House (New York, NY), 1992.

(With Barbara Gibson) The Kennedys: The Third Generation, Thunder's Mouth Press (Emeryville, CA), 1993.

(With Marita Lorenz) Marita: One Woman's Extraordinary Tale of Love and Espionage from Castro to Kennedy, Thunder's Mouth Press (Emeryville, CA), 1993.

(With Peter MacDonald) The Last Warrior: Peter Mac-Donald and the Navajo Nation, Orion Books (New York, NY), 1993.

Healing in the Name of God: Faith or Fraud?, Zondervan (Grand Rapids, MI), 1993.

(With LaVonne McKee) Get Ready to Say Goodbye: A Mother's Story of Senseless Violence, Tragedy, and Triumph, New Horizon Press (Far Hills, NJ), 1994.

(With Geraldine Barr) My Sister Roseanne: The True Story of Roseanne Barr Arnold, Carol Publishing (Secaucus, NJ), 1994.

(With Barbara Gibson) Rose Kennedy and Her Family: The Best and Worst of Their Lives and Times, Carol Publishing (Secaucus, NJ), 1995.

(With Paul Reed) Kontum Diary: Captured Writings Bring Peace to a Vietnam Veteran, Summit Publishing (Arlington, TX), 1996.

Free Speech and False Profits: Ethics in the Media, Pilgrim Press (Cleveland, OH), 1996.

To Love a Child: A Reluctant Father Adopts a "Forgotten" Child, New Horizons Press (Far Hills, NJ), 1996.

(With Tom Rybak) Trust No One: The Glamorous Life and Bizarre Death of Doris Duke, St. Martin's Press (New York, NY), 1997.

(With Tonya Flynt-Vega) Hustled: My Journey from Fear to Faith, Westminister John Knox Press (Louisville, KY), 1998.

Kids and Guns: The History, the Present, the Dangers, and the Remedies, Franklin Watts (New York, NY), 1999.

(With Richard E. Goetzke) Hush! A Demon Sleeps beside Me: A True Story of Violent Secrets, Betrayal, and Courage, New Horizon Press (Far Hills, NJ), 1999.

(With Patricia Lawford Stewart) The Peter Lawford Story, Peabody Books (Poughkeepsie, NY), 2000.

(With Dale Griffis) Cheryl and Lynn Hersha, Secret Weapons: Two Sisters' Terrifying Story of Sex, Spies, and Sabotage, New Horizon Press (Far Hills, NJ), 2001.

(With Carol Cook) Whispers of Romance, Threats of Death: One Woman's Treacherous Ordeal with a Savage, Seductive, Unstoppable Serial Criminal—A True Story, New Horizon Press (Far Hills, NJ), 2002.

Joseph P. Kennedy: The Mogul, the Mob, the Statesman, and the Making of an American Myth, John Wiley & Sons (Hoboken, NJ), 2003.

Hollywood Confidential: How the Studios Beat the Mob at Their Own Game, Taylor Trade Publishing (Lan-ham, MD), 2007.

Ghostwriter of a business guide and several books about drug addiction and childhood health, for a number of publishers, including St. Martin's, McGraw, and Bobbs-Merrill. Author of columns, "Tips by Ted," Rangefinder, beginning 1970, and "Civil War Postal History," Stamp News, beginning 1976; also author of syndicated cartoon, "The Badge Guys," Newspaper Enterprise Association, 1971–73. Contributor of hundreds of articles to magazines, including Family Circle, Writer's Market, and Studio Photography. Contributing editor of Stamp News, beginning 1976, and Physician's Management.

PHOTOGRAPHY BOOKS

The Business Side of Photography, American Photographic Book Publishing Co. (New York, NY), 1969.

How to Make Money with Your Camera, H.P. Books (Tucson, AZ), 1974.

How to Start a Professional Photography Business, Regnery (Chicago, IL), 1977.

Amphoto Guide to Photographing Models, Amphoto (New York, NY), 1979.

How to Be a Freelance Photographer, Contemporary Books (Chicago, IL), 1980.

Consumer Guide to Model Photography, Consumer Guide, 1980.

Careers in Photography, Contemporary Books (Chicago, IL), 1981.

The Complete Business Guide for the Freelance and Professional Photographer, Focal Press (Woburn, MA), 1983.

The Professional Photographer's Handbook, McGraw (New York, NY), 1983.

Starting Your Own Photography Business, Focal Press (Boston, MA), 1984.

How to Make Money with Your Video Camera, Prentice-Hall (Englewood Cliffs, NJ), 1985.

(With Brian Stoppee) The Photographer's Guide to Using Light, Amphoto (New York, NY), 1986.

Contributor to The Encyclopedia of Practical Photography, Amphoto (New York, NY), 1978.

ADAPTATIONS: The Five of Me was produced as a television movie, Columbia Broadcasting System (CBS), 1981; False Arrest: The Joyce Lukezic Story was produced as an television miniseries, American Broadcasting Companies (ABC), 1991; Deadly Whispers was adapted as a television movie, CBS, 1995.

SIDELIGHTS: Ted Schwarz is a prolific author who has written books on a wide variety of subjects, including photography, coin collecting, writing, cooking, children and gun safety, ethics in the media, and faith healing. However, he is probably best known for his numerous "celebrity" biographies, often cowritten with their subjects or with someone close to their subjects.

In False Arrest: The Joyce Lukezic Story, cowritten with Lukezic, Schwarz presents the tale of a woman who fell victim to an Arizona law that allows someone to be convicted of a crime on the basis of charges by someone who has previously confessed to the same crime. The crime in question was the murder of Lukezic's husband's business partner, Patrick Redmond, and Redmond's mother-in-law. The man who confessed to the crime stated that Lukezic had contracted the murders. False Arrest not only details the particulars of the murder but Lukezic's two-year ordeal in jail before she was cleared of the charges. It was adapted for an ABC television miniseries.

In his 1992 solo effort Walking with the Damned: The Shocking Murder of the Man Who Freed 30,000 Prisoners from the Nazis, Schwarz tells the tale of Count Folke Bernadotte, a member of a Swedish royal family who, as a Red Cross representative near the end of World War II, managed to negotiate with Heinrich Himmler the release of 30,000 death camp prisoners. Bernadotte later represented the United Nations in Palestine during peace negotiations on the first Arab-Israeli conflict.

While working there, he was assassinated by Zionist terrorists in 1948. According to a reviewer in Publishers Weekly: "The material which the author has collected on Bernadotte is thin; he has padded it with a rehash of Himmler's rise to power, the development of the death camps, and a murky account of internecine struggles among Palestinian Jews."

In another book cowritten with its subject, Marita: One Woman's Extraordinary Tale of Love and Espionage from Castro to Kennedy, Schwarz relates the bizarre and purportedly true life story of Marita Lorenz, a woman who claims to have had a love affair with Fidel Castro when she was nineteen and subsequently gives birth to his baby. According to Marita, the CIA convinced her incorrectly that Castro had been responsible for the infant's death, and she then agreed to try to assassinate the Cuban dictator. Among Marita's many other adventures are gunrunning with Lee Harvey Oswald and an affair with Venezuela dictator Marcos Perez Jimenez. Reviewing the book for Entertainment Weekly, Rhonda Johnson remarked that "conspiracy buffs and camp enthusiasts alike will appreciate this Cold War memoir," but went on to note: "Buried in the drama is an important story about covert operations in the U.S., but the complete lack of corroboration tends to undermine the author's credibility, leaving some of her tales … just a bit open to question."

Schwarz cowrote Trust No One: The Glamorous Life and Bizarre Death of Doris Duke with Tom Rybak, a former employee of infamous heiress Doris Duke. Inheriting a fortune at an early age after the death of her tobacco baron father, Duke embarked on a life of excess that included failed marriages, numerous affairs, drug and alcohol addiction, and jet-setting around the world. The exact cause of her death, at age eighty, though attributed to an overdose of morphine, has long been a subject of speculation. Reviewing Trust No One for Booklist, Kathleen Hughes stated: "This book, while rendering a concise, if extremely dark, portrayal of the lives of the very wealthy, leaves the reader with the feeling of witnessing a bad car accident, horrified and repulsed yet somehow transfixed." Elizabeth Mellett, writing in Library Journal, observed that "Schwarz has done a competent job, but not everyone would speak with him, and the book becomes repetitive in the final chapters." Mellett also observed that Trust No One has nothing new to offer in terms of resolving the puzzle of Duke's death.

Schwarz's 1999 offering Hush! A Demon Sleeps beside Me: A True Story of Violent Secrets, Betrayal, and Cour-age was cowritten with Richard E. Goetzke. It tells Goetzke's story of his marriage to Lauren Wexler, a woman who turned out to have six alternate personalities, all of them with distinct voices and appearances. Schwarz and Goetzke relate how the latter was violently attacked by Lauren and arrested for spousal abuse when he bruised her wrist trying to defend himself. Goetzke's efforts to help his wife get treatment for her disorder proved to no avail.

Whispers of Romance, Threats of Death: One Woman's Treacherous Ordeal with a Savage, Seductive, Unstoppable Serial Criminal—A True Story, written with Carol Cook (then Bryan), tells the story of Bryan's traumatic experiences with rape and how she unwittingly turned to the man who raped her for help. In 1988, after living in Dallas for only a short time, Bryan was sexually assaulted in her home by a serial rapist known as the Ski Mask Rapist and unable to identify her assailant because of the mask he wore. As a relatively new arrival, Bryan had few friends in the Dallas area, and she turned to an acquaintance, Gilbert Escobedo, for help during her crisis. Escobedo was confident and smooth-talking, a successful businessman and devoted Christian who seemed very concerned about Bryan's welfare. The two became close friends, business partners, and even romantic partners for a short time. However, as their various relationships progressed, Bryan began to develop suspicions that Escobedo was not who he seemed. His temper, possessiveness, and obsessive behavior did not mesh with his outward persona, and as Bryan worked with the police to identify the Ski Mask Rapist, she began to see more and more connections between her new friend and her attacker, leading to dramatic and terrifying realizations. "Cook's story is moving, and readers may agree that it needs to be told," commented a Publishers Weekly reviewer. Booklist reviewer James Klise remarked that the work offers "a plainspoken testimony of one woman's courageous struggle to overcome a violent assault."

Joseph P. Kennedy: The Mogul, the Mob, the Statesman, and the Making of an American Myth focuses on the storied patriarch of America's often celebrated, sometimes reviled, and ultimately tragic Kennedy family. Schwarz discusses in depth both the positive and negative aspects of Joe Kennedy's life, including his prohibition-era bootlegging and association with notorious criminals such as Al Capone; his political life, including serving as ambassador to the Court of Saint James; his rocky relationship with British political leaders who decried Kennedy's sympathetic stance toward Hitler; and his well-publicized womanizing. Schwarz also examines Kennedy's positive traits, such as his business acumen, his Hollywood successes, his ability to surround himself with talented and competent subordinates; and his desire to see his children—particularly the son who became legendary president John F. Kennedy—excel and achieve fame, respectability, and acceptance where he could not. Reviewer Bryce Christensen, writing in Booklist, called the book a "balanced and scrupulously researched biography" and "a convincing portrait of a giant whose influence still shapes American life."

Schwarz once told CA that he began writing during his childhood, compelled by an introvert's need to communicate with a larger number of people than he would "otherwise have the courage to face." After experiencing his first success at age fifteen with the sale of an article to a hobby publication, he concentrated on improving his style and ability, often neglecting his schoolwork in the process. A firm believer that a writer is only as good as his or her next work, he constantly lives with "a very mild case of nervous tension" and feels guilty when away from the typewriter for any length of time.

With perseverance, anyone can become a professional writer, maintained Schwarz: "It is often said that new writers have no chance. This has been said so long that, if it were true, all writing would have stopped after Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John died and the Bible was published. There is great opportunity in this field that many writers fear to take advantage of. Other writers worry about talent. Writing is a growth field. I have no idea what talent is or if I have it. A new writer should write, try to understand where mistakes were made, and then write again. If the individual can keep writing, not repeating past mistakes but improving a little each time, at some point that person will be selling. No one succeeds in this field without sitting down and doing the work."

Schwarz additionally told CA: "I am getting more involved with fiction, both in developing projects for television and in writing novels. I will probably try to spend between a quarter and a third of my time writing fiction. I not only like the freedom it provides to not have to travel quite so much, I also enjoy the challenge of creating a world which has never existed before, populating it with people no one knew until I created them, then making them all come so alive that the reader wants to spend a couple of hours in that world."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

Booklist, March 15, 1994, Sue-Ellen Beauregard, review of Get Ready to Say Goodbye: A Mother's Story of Senseless Violence, Tragedy, and Triumph, p. 1309; September 15, 1994, Ilene Cooper, review of My Sister Roseanne: The True Story of Roseanne Barr Arnold, p. 82; March 15, 1997, Kathleen Hughes, review of Trust No One: The Glamorous Life and Bizarre Death of Doris Duke, p. 1223; March 15, 2002, James Klise, review of Whispers of Romance, Threats of Death: One Woman's Treacherous Ordeal with a Savage, Seductive, Unstoppable Serial Criminal—A True Story, p. 1192; August, 2003, Bryce Christensen, review of Joseph P. Kennedy: The Mogul, the Mob, the Statesman, and the Making of an American Myth, p. 1949; June 1, 2004, Donna Seaman, "Top 10 Biographies," review of Joseph P. Kennedy, p. 1694.

Cosmopolitan, November, 1993, Chris Chase, review of Marita: One Woman's Extraordinary Tale of Love and Espionage from Castro to Kennedy, p. 30.

Entertainment Weekly, December 3, 1993, Rhonda Johnson, review of Marita, p. 66.

Library Journal, March 15, 1997, Elizabeth Mellett, review of Trust No One, p. 70; September 15, 2003, Karl Helicher, "Revisiting the Kennedy Legacy," review of Joseph P. Kennedy, p. 70.

Publishers Weekly, February 16, 1990, review of False Arrest: The Joyce Lukezic Story, p. 64; January 13, 1992, review of Walking with the Damned: The Shocking Murder of the Man Who Freed 30,000 Prisoners from the Nazis, p. 43; October 18, 1993, review of The Last Warrior: Peter MacDonald and the Navajo Nation, p. 43; October 25, 1993, review of The Kennedys: The Third Generation, p. 54; February 7, 1994, review of Get Ready to Say Goodbye, p. 77; October 31, 1994, review of My Sister Roseanne, p. 51; May 6, 1996, review of Kontum Diary: Captured Writings Bring Peace to a Vietnam Veteran, p. 65; February 3, 1997, review of Trust No One, p. 86; November 1, 1999, review of Hush! A Demon Sleeps beside Me: A True Story of Violent Secrets, Betrayal, and Courage, p. 70; February 26, 2001, review of Secret Weapons: Two Sisters' Terrifying Story of Sex, Spies, and Sabotage, p. 77; February 4, 2002, review of Whispers of Romance, Threats of Death, p. 64; July 7, 2003, review of Joseph P. Kennedy, p. 60.