Sally Jenkins

Sally Jenkins is an award-winning journalist for The Washington Post and is the author and co-author of 12 books, including four bestsellers. In 2012 she published the No.1 bestseller Sum it Up with legendary basketball coach Pat Summitt, shortly after Summitt was diagnosed with Alzheimer's Disease. In 2008 she combined a knowledge of sports with a moonlighting passion for historical research to write The Real All Americans, the true story of how the Carlisle Indian School took on the Ivy League in football at the turn of the century and won, pioneering the forward pass and other innovations. Born in Texas and raised in New York City, she is the daughter of legendary sportswriter and novelist Dan Jenkins, who carted her to various championships on summer vacations. She graduated with a degree in English Literature from Stanford University in 1982 and launched a career in newspapers that began with a stint as an assistant to a Hollywood gossip columnist, and later branched out to include coverage of the 9-11 terrorist strike on New York, Hurricane Katrina, and profiles of various political figures for the Washington Post, including Hillary Clinton, Sarah Palin, and Howard Dean. In 2005 Jenkins became the first woman ever inducted into the National Sportswriters and Sportscasters Hall of Fame. She is a six-time winner of Columnist of the Year awards from the Associated Press (2001, 2003, 2010, 2011) and the Society of Professional Journalists (2001, 2011). In 2013 she won first place from the Associated Press sports editors for a special investigative project she conceived on the inverted world of medical care in the National Football League, entitled "Do No Harm." Her magazine work has appeared in Smithsonian, GQ, Sports Illustrated, and Parade. She lives in Sag Harbor, New York, for the waters.