Stephen Kurkjian to Speak at St. James Men’s Club
WATERTOWN — Award-winning journalist Stephen Kurkjian will be the speaker at the St. James Men’s Club dinner meeting on Monday, April 6. He will speak about his new book, Master Thieves, based on his decades-long investigation of the 1990 break-in at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum and the theft of several priceless paintings and sketches — possibly the greatest art theft in history.
Kurkjian was a longtime investigative journalist at the Boston Globe, where he won several Pulitzer Prizes for his investigative work.
Kurkjian is no stranger to St. James Church. His parents, Anooshavan and Rosella, were married at the church in 1938.
He was born in Boston and attended Boston public schools, including the prestigious Boston Latin School and earned his bachelor’s degree in English literature from Boston Unviersity, followed by a law degree from Suffolk Law School.
He joined the Boston Globe as a reporter in 1968 and decided to pursue a career in journalism rather than law. He soon made his mark with two stories he covered in the summer of 1969: Sen. Edward Kennedy’s accident on Chappaquiddick Island and the Woodstock music festival.
He had an outstanding career at the Globe, including being a founding member and later editor of the Spotlight Team, as well as chief of the paper’s Washington Bureau during the Reagan and Bush administrations.
He shared in the Pulitzer Prize for investigative reporting and public service on three occasions, in 1972, 1980 and 2002, when he was a member of the team which revealed the extent of the clergy sexual abuse in the Boston Catholic Archdiocese.
The social hour stars with mezza at 6:15 p.m., followed by a traditional kheyma and losh kebab dinner at 7 p.m. The dinner meeting will be at the ST. James Armenian Church Charles Mosesian Cultural and Youth Center, Keljik Hall, 465 Mount Auburn St.
The program is open to the public and ladies are welcome.
