Frank Rich

Frank Rich
Frank Rich at the 73rd Annual Peabody Awards
Born	Frank Hart Rich, Jr. (1949-06-02) June 2, 1949 (age 67)
Occupation	Essayist, columnist
Alma mater	Harvard College
Genre	Non-fiction
Spouse	Gail Winston (divorced) Alexandra Rachelle Witchel
Children	with Winston: --Nathaniel Rich --Simon Rich

Frank Hart Rich, Jr. (born June 2, 1949) is an American essayist, op-ed columnist and writer notable for having held various positions within The New York Times from 1980 to 2011.

On March 1, 2011, it was announced that he would be leaving the Times to become an essayist and editor-at-large for New York magazine starting in June 2011.

Rich grew up in Washington, D.C. His mother, Helen Fisher (née Aaronson), an artist, was from a Russian Jewish family originally settled in Manhattan, but moved to Washington after the stock market crash of 1929. His father, Frank Hart Rich, a businessman, was from a German Jewish family long-settled in Washington. He attended public schools and graduated from Woodrow Wilson High School in 1967.

He attended Harvard College in Cambridge, Massachusetts. At Harvard, he became the editorial chairman of The Harvard Crimson, the university's daily student newspaper. Rich was an honorary Harvard College scholar and a member of Phi Beta Kappa, and received a Henry Russell Shaw Traveling Fellowship. He graduated in 1971 with an A.B. magna cum laude in American history and literature.

Before joining The New York Times in 1980, Rich was a film critic for Time and The New York Post, and film critic and senior editor of New Times Magazine. In the early 1970s, he was a founding editor of the Richmond (Va.) Mercury.