Acclaimed author Thomas Hauser my be best known. as the official biographer of Muhammad Ali and a member of the International Boxing Hall of Fame, but he's also the author of many best-selling books like Missing and Final Warning: The Legacy of Chernobyl. Both of those popular books were turned into movies.
Hauser is now out with his most personal work, My Mother and Me: A Memoir.
Hauser joins SportsJam with Doug Doyle to talk about his new book, his relationship with his mother and his amazing writing career.
My Mother and Me is a portrait of a remarkable woman and a moving exploration of the bond between a mother and son. Hauser says he waited until his mother passed away at the age of 96 before he wrote the memoir.
"One of the things she said to me when we talked about me writing this book was don't make me out to be a saint. You can write about the things I did wrong too, including the affairs."
Hauser's mom Ellie gave Thomas a whole stack of love letters that figure very prominently in the book.
"She said I trust your judgement and use them any way you want."
Eleanor (Ellie) was well aware that her son had gained fame as a writer. What fuels Thomas Hauser?
"One of the things I love about writing is that I can take any subject I want and learn about it. Obviously I known in many circles as a boxing writer and I very happy with the boxing writing I've done but I've written a philosophy on moral values, a love story set in a large Wall Street law firm, novels about Mark Twain, Charles Dickens and Beethoven. I can take as much as five months to two years on a subject and write about it and I love it."
During the SportsJam interview Hauser talks about how Ellie developed a lifelong attachment to Frank Sinatra. At age seventeen, she was one of the bobbysoxers at his breakthrough engagement at The Paramount Theatre in Times Square.
Hauser's father was only casually interested in sports while his mother wasn't interested at all. She did enjoy meeting Muhammad Ali and talking photos with him.
Thomas loves sports, both as a participant and a fan. He says he has lived and died with the New York Yankees. His favorite was Mickey Mantle.
Given his interest in sports, it was just a matter of time before he got involved with WKCR (the student-run radio station at Columbia). He called play-by-play for some Columbia basketball games. But his most notable contribution to WKCR was creating and hosting a weekly radio show called Personalities in Sports. Some of his guests included Joe Namath and and Willis Reed.
The Manhattan resident would eventually start writing about sports and other topics that mattered to him. His biography of boxing great Muhammad Ali titled Muhammad Ali: His Life and Times was nominated for the National Book Award. Ali and his wife approached Hauser about the project.
"Muhammad had been my boyhood hero. I went out to the farm and had trouble making eye contact with Muhammad at first and then I woke up the next morning, went down to the kitchen. Muhammad was sitting there and he looked at me and said do you want Cornflakes or Granola? (Laughing) I then just loosened up and related to him as Muhammad. I'll never have a professional project that brings me as much as that did."
Hauser also collaborated with legendary golfer Arnold Palmer on a biography entitled Arnold Palmer A Personal Journey published in 1994.
The author has been featured in numerous documentaries about the sport including the Academy Award-winning When We Were Kings.
You can SEE the entire SportsJam interview with Thomas Hauser here.
