Ed Zahniser was born in DC, raised in Hyattsville, MD, and served in the US Army in the US and Korea (1968 – 1970). On his return to DC, he co-founded Some Of Us Press, was poetry editor of Wilderness magazine and an associate poetry editor of Antietam Review. His poems have appeared in over 100 literary magazines in the US and UK; he is the author of four full-length books, most recently At Betty’s Restaurant Thomas Shepherd Loves Danske Dandridge and The Shepherdstown Sonnets (Four Seasons Books, 2014) and Mall-hopping with the Great I AM (Somondoco Press, 2006); and three chapbooks, most recently Slow Down and Live, a collaboration with artist and designer Heather Watson of Pernot & Tatlin (2011). His Some Of Us Press book, The Ultimate Double Play, was his first published book, released in 1974.
Zahniser lives in Shepherdstown, WV, where he is the co-founder and poetry editor of the all-volunteer community quarterly The Good News Paper. He edited the anthology In Good Company: 27 Poets Celebrating the 250th Anniversary of Shepherdstown and has hosted an annual fundraiser for his local public library for multiple years. With Karen Z. Bettacchi, he published the nonfiction book Ways to the Wilderness (Atlantis Rising Communications, 1998).
Zahniser recently retired from the National Park Service Publications Group in Harpers Ferry, WV after 35 years of service. In that capacity he lectured widely and led seminars on wilderness preservation topics.
