Christopher Mele

I’ve long been drawn to stories, reading them, listening to them and telling them. At family get-togethers, I was captivated as a child to hear my parents and relatives tell tales from the past or from their own lives. That seed took root in me at a very young age and melded with a deep curiosity about the world and currents events.

Thus, from about the time I was 9 years old, I knew I wanted to be a newsman, specifically working newspapers.

As a kid, I delivered the New York Daily News and read it voraciously. I was drawn to the accounts of crime, politics and breaking news. I went on to graduate college with a degree in journalism and began my reporting career almost 40 years ago in the Adirondack Mountains of New York State in the United States.

Since that time, I’ve worked as an investigative reporter and editor in the Hudson Valley in New York and led a newsroom in the Poconos in Pennsylvania as its executive editor.

Since 2014, I’ve worked at The New York Times, first as a copy editor on the Metro desk, and then as a reporter and editor on the breaking news team, Express.

Express serves as a police scanner for the world, listening and looking for breaking news and trending topics online I was part of the 2023 Pulitzer Prize finalist team for breaking news coverage of the Bronx fire that claimed 17 lives.

My wife, Meg McGuire, has also been a lifelong journalist, so it’s fun when we can talk shop or work together.

We had a great time at Pueblo Ingles volunteering our time. The students were engaging, enthusiastic, ready to learn and asked lots of questions. We learned so much about their lives and about Spain through our extended conversations. Travel really does expand your horizons and helps you see the world differently. We definitely came home with many stories to tell!