In 1967, Trudy Knowles left her small town in Kentucky and headed to Lake Forest College near Chicago. She attended class, studied, joined softball games on the campus green, hung out in Hixson Lounge, played her guitar under the trees, and became involved in the anti-war movement. In the spring of 1970, Trudy attended the college’s study-abroad program in Athens, Greece, intending to return to Lake Forest for her senior year. Instead, she embarked on a trip around the world, traveling with a friend in a VW van. When the van was sold in Kabul, Afghanistan, they continued their travels for two more years using public transportation. The trip transformed her life.

Trudy completed her degree at Centre College in Kentucky, earned her master’s degree at the University of Nebraska at Omaha, and obtained her doctorate at the University of Tennessee in Knoxville. She was a professor of education for twenty-five years, retiring in 2016.

Trudy is the co-author of What Every Middle School Teacher Should Know and author of The Kids Behind the Label: An Inside Look at ADHD for Classroom Teachers. Her essay, “The Miracle Message,” appears in Chicken Soup for the Soul: Miracles and the Unexplainable. She is also the author of numerous professional journal articles.

As an activist since the early sixties, Trudy still protests, marches, demonstrates, writes letters, and speaks out for peace and social justice. Her life motto comes from a bumper sticker she saw in upstate New York one day, “Dance with Reckless Abandon.” She does that every day.

Trudy lives in Westfield, Massachusetts, with her husband. She has five children and four grandchildren who are the lights of her life.

www.trudyknowles.com

Larone Family Press