By Ralph Rice
Tribune Correspondent
CHESAPEAKE, Md. - Gary Clites, who was born in Cumberland and  raised in Carpenter’s Addition, which is now part of Carpendale, has recently had a novel published. That novel, “Seneca Wood,” has been nominated for the Top Thriller for 2009 on the Preditors & Editors website.
Publishing a novel has been a dream come true for Clites, and in the process he has been able to help foster an  interest in journalism in the students he has taught over the years.
Clites graduated from Frankfort High School in Short Gap in 1978. He went to Potomac State College and then on to West Virginia University, where he pursued his major in news-editorial journalism.  He graduated in 1982 and worked in television and radio and in between those jobs, he started substitute teaching at a local high school.
While substituting, he found he had a deep love for teaching.  In the late ‘80s, he returned to school to earn his certificate in secondary education from Frostburg State University.
In 1988, he and his wife – whom he met at Frankfort High - moved to Calvert County, Md., to teach. Over the years, Gary worked with other teachers and the Calvert County Schools to develop a model journalism and communications program for the county.
In 1995, he earned his masters in journalism
 from the Philip Merrill College of Journalism at the University of Maryland.  Around the same time, he was hired as technology columnist for the Dow Jones Newspaper Fund’s Adviser Update, the publication for journalism teachers and advisers. It is a post which he still holds to this very day.  In 1995, he joined the Board of Directors of the Maryland Scholastic Press Association. A little over a year later, he was elected president of the organization, which later became the Maryland-DC Scholastic Press Association, a post he held for 12 years.
Over that period, Gary became a nationally known writer and speaker on journalism education, speaking at conferences and conventions and publishing articles in a number of magazines and newsletters.  He consulted on three national textbooks and won four national recognitions as a journalism educator, including winning second place in the Dow Jones Newspaper Fund’s National Journalism Teacher of the Year program and a Gold Key from the Columbia Scholastic Press Adviser’s Association at Columbia University.
As a writer, even though he is a journalist, Gary had never lost his interest in fiction. He had always wanted to write and over the years worked on the manuscript of “Seneca Wood,” his first novel  published by Casperian Books in the spring of 2009.
Whether his book wins the title of Best Thriller will be determined by online vote.
The  contest can be viewed at  http://www.critters.org/predpoll/novelthrill.shtml. To vote,   click on the button for “Seneca Wood,”  fill in your name and e-mail address at the bottom of the page  and type in the security words and click to submit. Later  the website  send you an e-mail link. Click on that and it will take you to a web page which will confirm your vote.
Deadline to cast your vote is Thursday, Jan. 14.
For more information on Clites himself, visit  http://www.garyclites.com.
Copies of his book are available locally at Main Street Books in Keyser. It is also available through Amazon.com and other online bookstores.
Clites presently lives in Chesapeake Beach, Md., with his wife Robin and daughters Rachel and Mallory.