Steve Hannah began his career working for CBS News in New York, then spent almost two decades as a pretty good reporter, sometime columnist, State Capitol Bureau Chief, Metropolitan Editor, Managing Editor and Executive Editor of the Milwaukee Journal. He devoted twelve years of his life to writing a syndicated column called “State of Mind,” which was far and away the best job he ever had. The last eleven years of his career were spent as CEO of The Onion, America’s Finest News Source.

He grew up on the east coast and, quite by accident, found himself in a mysterious place called Wisconsin when--in a nutshell--he took a wrong turn en route to Los Angeles. He liked Wisconsin very much but, seeing how he was planning on becoming a household name in network TV news, he decided that he would stay for just a year, two at most.

As of this writing, he has lived and worked in Wisconsin for most of the past 43 years. He has owned a home on the Wisconsin River in Sauk County since 1978. It is his favorite place in the world.

He won numerous prizes for writing during his career, including awards from the Associated Press, United Press International, the Wisconsin Newspaper Association, the Milwaukee Press Club, and the Scripps Howard Foundation. Furthermore, he shared a Peabody Award for creation of the Onion News Network. In 2020, his book Dairylandia won the 30th Annual Midwest Book Award.

He was also President of the Wisconsin Associated Press.

He earned his undergraduate degree at Colgate University in Hamilton, New York, then did a year of graduate study at University College, Dublin, Ireland, but, alas,  spent too much time hitting the pubs and not enough hitting the books. So he left without getting his graduate degree. His mother was very disappointed.

 He once spent a winter night in northern Wisconsin with a guy who invented a contraption that would strip the intact shell off a hardboiled egg by employing an electrifying two-handed thrust that resembled the Heimlich maneuver. While the experience didn’t exactly change his life, it was a lot more interesting than covering the State Legislature.

 He divides his time these days between his home in Sauk County and Austin, Texas.