Arthur Cohen

Updated July 2025

After graduation I attended Mass Bay Community College for two years and finished with a degree in history from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst in 1969. I began working in radio while a student at the University as an engineer for WFCR-FM, a professional public radio station operated by the University in cooperation with the other area colleges (Amherst, Smith, Mt. Holyoke, and Hampshire). At $3.00 an hour, it was the best paying student job on campus. I continued to work at WFCR after graduation as the station’s first News Director and eventually Program Director. People who lived in the area in that period might have also heard me from time-to-time as a DJ on the student station, WMUA-FM.

Drug Charge

While a student at the University, in February 1968, I was arrested early one morning in a dorm room along with several other students on a marijuana charge. In my case, being in the presence. Others were charged with possession. We were among the first students arrested for pot at Umass. I spent a night at the Amherst town jail and a morning at the county jail in Northampton. The worst moment of life was that morning when my parents drove to Northampton and used their mortgage to bail me out. I was wearing a prison uniform. We all eventually pleaded guilty to avoid jail time. I did several years’ probation. Seemed not have much effect on my life or career.

Woodstock

Yes, I was at Woodstock. It promised to be a lovely few days of camping while listening to my favorite bands. Several friends and I set off in a small caravan. We were probably among the last to get in. My Chevy Corvair immediately became stuck in some mud. I left a day early; arrived home covered with mud, but glad I was there. Don’t seem to have made the movie.

Vietnam

I did not serve in Vietnam. I was opposed to the war from the start and over time decided I was a pacifist. I applied for status as a conscientious objector after I received a low number in the draft lottery and planned to resist the draft and go to jail if necessary. After a tense meeting with the Norwood Draft Board, where I made it clear I would go to jail, they granted me CO status. As an alternative to military service, I was sent to Mass General to work as an orderly, but Mass General did not have a job for me. I spent the next two years working at WFCR and never heard from the Draft Board again.

I would like to mention Francis Crowe, a remarkable woman, a Quaker, who lived in Northampton, Massachusetts and dedicated much of her life to peace activism and protest. She served as my Draft Counselor and guided me through the process.

Personal Life

I am gay, LGBTQ+ if you prefer. I figured out I was gay at about age 12 or 13, in Junior High. I know that seems incredibly young, but there has never been any question about it since. I was appalled and fearful at first, but gradually came to terms with it. I knew the biblical injunctions against homosexuality and was also aware of the attacks on gay people throughout the McCarthy era. I thought it best to keep it a secret. Not sure if I succeeded, but I did pull back from some school activities and adjusted my friendships to avoid getting too close. I assumed I was the only gay person in the class or even in the high school. Of course, that was unlikely to be true, but I had no perspective at the time. It was not in my nature or ability to try and pretend to be straight and date women.

I did not officially come out until the early 70s. Prior to that I remained deeply closeted and made no attempt to lead a gay social life. I did not even really know where to find gay people.

The Stonewall “riots” opened the door for me, and I gradually came out to friends and family. I also came out to my employers. Over the years since I have had several serious, and one decade-long relationship, but I am currently single. My cat Liam and I live in a condo in Quincy, Massachusetts.

After moving to Boston in 1976 for work, I became something of an activist. I marched in the early protest versions of what is now the gay pride parade. I was a member of an organization called the Gay & Lesbian Speakers Bureau, and spoke regularly at high schools and other venues. I was its president one year. The organization still exists and is called Speak Out.

I also became a board member of the iconic Boston-based gay & lesbian publication, Gay Community News. Currently I am board chair of the The Gay & Lesbian Review Worldwide, a magazine that’s been publishing reviews of books, movies, art, and feature articles about the LGBTQ community for 30 years.

Journalism and Filmmaking

I have been a broadcast journalist, documentary filmmaker and educator since graduating from the University of Massachusetts. My credits include PBS, National Geographic, WGBH, A&E, The Family Channel, USA Network, and WCVB, Boston.

For almost 19 years I was a part-time reporter and anchor for WBZ Radio in Boston. I retired at the end of 2021.

I have won eight New England Emmy Awards.

After my time at WFCR, I took a brief commercial radio gig in Springfield, and then to WGBY-TV in Springfield to produce an environmental documentary series called The Habitat Project (as part of it I moderated a TV debate between Ralph Nader and MIT professor Norman Rasmussen over nuclear power). After that I began working at WGBH-TV in Boston, where I was a reporter for The Ten O’Clock News with Christopher Lydon.

While at WGBH I also produced a number of local documentaries on subjects ranging from gay and lesbian high school students (Growing Up Gay), the controversy surrounding the Seabrook nuclear power plant (Do We need Seabrook?), a look at South Boston High School ten years after busing wrenched it apart (From Busing to Books), and the relocation of the Orange Line in Boston after the cancellation of a major highway project (The Orange Line: Good News, Bad news), among many others.

I returned to WGBH as Senior Producer for the CPB/Annenberg funded series The Western Tradition, a 52-part instructional series on the history of western civilization. I also produced several episodes of the PBS medical series Bodywatch.

I produced segments and programs for the daily magazine show Chronicle on WCVB-TV in Boston.

Since 1995 I have worked with Oceanic Research Group and Jonathan Bird making underwater nature documentaries on subjects ranging from sharks to shipwrecks (I do not dive or even swim, but work as writer, editor, narrator). I also have worked on the syndicated public television series Jonathan Bird’s Blue World and contributed to the YouTube channel Blue World TV (blueworldtv.com). I also co-produced and co-wrote two giant screen films with Jonathan Bird: Ancient Caves released in 2020 (https://macgillivrayfreeman.com/project/ancient-caves/) and Astronaut: Ocean to Orbit released in 2021 (https://macgillivrayfreeman.com/project/astronaut/). I am a cowriter on the giant screen film, Call of the Dolphins released in 2025 (https://macgillivrayfreeman.com/project/call-of-the-dolphins/).

Education

I began working in education as the Senior Producer for the Massachusetts Corporation for Educational Telecommunications (MCET), a pre-Internet organization that produced live instructional programs from a studio in Cambridge, distributed over satellite. Students could interact via telephone. After that I taught film and video production at The New England Institute of Art in Brookline, Massachusetts for close to twenty years. I have also taught in the journalism program at Northeastern University and the communications program at Emerson College.

Final Notes and Memories

Sharon High has deep roots in my family. Both of my sisters graduated from Sharon High and my niece and nephew also graduated from Sharon High. One of my sisters still lives in Sharon, so I visit regularly.

I did not have many close friends in high school, my fault. In high school I actually don’t know how other people thought of me, but I assume I was thought to be the classic nerd. I walked around with a brief case and a pocket protector. I was terrible at sports, and usually picked last for teams during gym class with some derogatory comment, which was more hurtful than you might think. I never understood why the teachers thought that was OK. Somehow, despite being quite shy, I ended up as president of the Audio-Visual Club.

On April 23, 1965, during our senior year, I took the day off from school to participate in the protest march led by Dr. Martin Luther King through Roxbury to the Boston Common. I remember standing only a few yards away from the bandstand during his speech.

I have lived my whole life in Massachusetts including Amherst, Sunderland and Hatfield in the western part of the state, and then to Watertown, the Back Bay and South End in Boston, and Brookline, before moving to Quincy.

A shout out to Mary Gorman, who taught me English for the first two years of high school and organized a field trip to hear Robert Frost read poetry at Boston College, an experience I will never forget; Irving Schwartz, who kindled my love for history; Leonard Greenfield who challenged me and taught me to love Shakespeare; and Roger Chappuis who taught a class called Advanced Humanities. Even though I didn’t do the reading diligently, somehow his lectures seeped into my brain, and I discovered during my first history class in college that I was way ahead of the other students.

I look forward to seeing everyone again this fall at our 60th reunion, and to reading all of your biographies.

Art