We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Jane Ammeson a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Jane, appreciate you joining us today. Everyone has crazy stuff happen to them, but often small business owners and creatives, artists and others who are doing something off the beaten path are often hit with things (positive or negative) that are so out there, so unpredictable and unexpected. Can you share a crazy story from your journey?

I had flown out to Palm Springs with a photographer and a public relations guy who had set up an interview for a magazine story I was writing with ex-President Gerald Ford at his residence there. The interview went very well, Ford was affable and friendly. Then, after just exiting his home, several Secret Service agents came hurrying out and told us to stop.

“President Ford’s calendar is missing,” they said. “You need to wait here.” So we stood in the sun, the three of us looking at each other wondering if the other had taken it for some reason, say as a souvenir. The agents stood close by, as if we were going to make a break for our rental car and speed away.

This stand-off must have lasted for about a half an hour, long enough that we wondered if we would make our flight home. We stood there mostly in silence, after all what can you chat about when the Secret Service is watching and listening. They didn’t invite us back into the house to sit down.

And so we just stood there. Wondering. After all, how well do you ever really know anyone?

Finally a couple of more agents came out of the house and started whispering to each other. I thought, oh, now they’re going to take us into custody–one of these guys I’m with did something stupid and swiped the president’s calendar and we’re all in trouble. Though surprisingly, they hadn’t asked to search us. The photographer had all this equipment–boxes and bags of it, and I had a briefcase.

Finally, one of the agents stepped forward. The president, he said, had misplaced his calendar but they had been able to locate it. We were free to go.

Jane, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

I am a features writer, working for newspapers, magazines, and also write travel apps and web stories. I have two blogs, one titled Travel/Food and another with book reviews and author interviews called Shelf Life. I am also a reviewer for the New York Journal of Books and have a weekly book column for a Chicago area newspaper and a weekly food column for the largest newspaper in Southwest Michigan and am a Taste Awards judge. I’ve authored 17 books, all non-fiction in such categories as historic true crime, food, travel, and history.
Among my most recent books are Lincoln Road Trip: The Back-Roads Guide to America’s Favorite President, a Bronze winner in the Travel Book category for the 2019-20 Lowell Thomas Travel Journalism Competition. Lincoln Road Trip was also a finalist for a 2019 Foreword Indie Award for Travel. My latest historic true crime is America’s Femme Fatale: The Story of Serial Killer Belle Gunness and her newest food-oriented book is Classic Restaurants of Northwest Indiana which was published by The History Press. I have two books that are coming out later this year, Little Ohio—a travel book focusing on charming Ohio towns with populations of 20,000 or under (Indiana University Press) and Classic Restaurants of Michiana (The History Press).

Written and curated by me with some guest bloggers, Travel/Food features content on both national and international destinations, food, cookbook reviews, recipes, food and travel trends, road trip ideas, travel and food products, restaurants, resorts, and cruises. T/F also posts my interviews with travel experts, chefs, gourmet food manufacturers, destination specialists, and authors. Travel/Food posts are distributed at the time of publication to my social media accounts including Instagram, Facebook, several Twitter accounts, LinkedIn, and Tumblr. Currently T/F is trending up to 200,000 visitors.

Chef interviews including Ina Garten, Tara Bench, Jerrelle Guy, Janet Fletcher, Paul Kahan, Ouita Michel, Katie Parla, Anne Willan, Paul Saginaw, Abra Berens, Melissa King, Stephanie Izard, Dorie Greenspan, Valerie Bertinelli, Tiffani Thiessen, Ming Tsai, Cat Cora, Danielle Walker, Lisa Ludwinski, Emeril, Mario Batali, Barbara Costello, Rick Bayless, Lidia Bastianich, Marcella Hazan, Lorenza D’Medici, Geoffrey Zakarian, Carla Hall, Nigella Lawson, Judson Todd Allen, Fabio, Jose Pizarro, Buddy Valastro, Gail Simmons, John Besh, Scott Conant, Kristin Cavallari, Mark Bittman, Diana Kennedy, Matt Moore, Evan Bloom, and Mindy Segal among others. Also featured are cookbook reviews, recipes, road trips, and food/travel trends.

My Shelf Life blog features book reviews and author interviews including John Meacham, John Grisham, David Baldacci, Alexandra Petri, Jimmy Carter, Karen White, Brad Metzger, Dennis Lehane, Erik Larson, Gretchen Carlson, Harlen Coben, Fiona Barton, Florence LaRue, Ginger Zee, Natalie Morales, and whoever else who will talk to me because they have a book to plug.

Is there a particular goal or mission driving your creative journey?

I want to entertain readers while informing and providing insights whether it’s about cooking, food, health, destinations, cultures, a person’s personality, their books, their creative endeavors, their accomplishments, their homes, how they got to the place where they’re at, what they hope to achieve.

What do you find most rewarding about being a creative?

When I’m working on my blog, I love the creation of taking a blank page and turning it into something I hope is enjoyable and readable and conveys my personality and my interest in the subject and also shines a light on whatever I’m writing about. The same is true with a blank screen when I’m writing a story–though unlike a blog I don’t get to add photos to liven it up. That happens when my editors lay out the pages.

So whether it’s building a post or a story, there’s this feeling of creativity and accomplishment. Sometimes it all flows very easily and sometimes it takes a lot of work. But it’s always, in the long run, fun.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://janeammeson.com; https://shelflife.blog/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/janeammeson
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/janesimonammeson
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jane-ammeson-08a2087/
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/travelfoodIN
• Other: https://www.tumblr.com/harborgirlwrites