Bob Batchelor is a critically-acclaimed cultural historian and biographer. He is a three-time winner of the Independent Press Book Award and has been hailed as “one of the greatest non-fiction writers and storytellers” by New York Times bestselling biographer Brian Jay Jones. His books examine modern popular culture icons, events, and topics, from comic books and music to literary figures and history’s outlaws.

By day, Bob is Vice President, Global Marketing and Communications at Workplace Options, a Raleigh-based company focused on holistic well-being services with 115,000 clients around the world serving 83 million members. By night, he is the author of 16 books, editor of 19 books, and has been published in a dozen languages. He is best known as biographer of Marvel icon Stan Lee, having written three biographies on the creative icon and authoring numerous essays and book chapters on Lee and his co-creations, one on Spider-Man appearing in Time magazine. Bob wrote: Stan Lee: A Life; Stan Lee: The Man Behind Marvel, Young Adult Edition; and Stan Lee: The Man Behind Marvel.

An interdisciplinary writer, Bob has published books on Jim Morrison and the Doors, Bob Dylan, The Great Gatsby, Mad Men, and John Updike, among others. Roadhouse Blues: Morrison, the Doors, and the Death Days of the Sixties won the IPA Book Award in the Music category. He wrote an award-winning illustrated history of Rookwood Pottery, the revolutionary company that became one of the great art potteries in the world, and The Bourbon King: The Life and Crimes of George Remus, Prohibition’s Evil Genius, a rollicking tale of the infamous bootleg baron, as widely known in the Roaring Twenties as Warren G. Harding and Babe Ruth. The latter won the IPA Book Award for Historical Biography. His latest book is on leadership in the twenty-first century, The Authentic Leader: The Power of Deep Leadership in Work and Life.

Bob’s work has appeared or been featured in the New York Times, Cincinnati Enquirer, Los Angeles Times, PopMatters, and Time. He has appeared as an on-air commentator for The National Geographic Channel, PBS NewsHour, PBS, the BBC, Wondery, and NPR, among dozens of others. He created the podcast “John Updike: American Writer, American Life” and “Tales of the Bourbon King: The Life and True Crimes of George Remus.” Bob also hosted “TriState True Crime” on WCPO’s Cincy Lifestyle television show.

Bob has deep experience helping bring other writers' books into the world as an editor. Much of this work has been through editing a handful of book series for Rowman & Littlefield, including “Contemporary American Literature,” “Sports Icons and Issues in Popular Culture,” “100 Greatest…,” “Great Authors/Great Books,” and “The Cultural History of Television.” All told, these series have produced dozens of books.

Bob has published widely in journals, anthologies, and via various media and journalistic outlets, including PopMatters, Radical History Review, The Journal of American Culture, The Mailer Review, The American Prospect Online, The John Updike Review, and Public Relations Review, as well as dozens of essays in books and monographs.

A former college professor and academic entrepreneur, Bob taught at a number of universities in the US and abroad. He specialized in strategic communications, public relations, mass communication, popular culture, film, and literary studies. Prior to becoming a teacher, he worked for more than a decade in corporate, internal, and executive communications for a number of large companies, including Ernst & Young, FleishmanHillard, and Bank of America, as well as The History Factory, where he served as Senior Historian.

At FleishmanHillard, Bob was on the team that won the 2001 PRSA Silver Anvil in B2B Marketing for Documentum. As a strategic communications consultant, Bob worked with startups, technology companies, manufacturing firms, publishers, and nonprofits, including UKG, HP, the Dallas Mavericks, Norsk Titanium, Rookwood, and Cintas, among others. He consulted with numerous organizations on a variety of projects, from book marketing and media relations to writing and strategic planning. He has been particularly interested in corporate history and helped organizations find ways to make their pasts come alive, including web site content and the creation of corporate museums and exhibits.

Bob earned undergraduate degrees in History, Philosophy, and Political Science from the University of Pittsburgh. He was awarded a master's degree in American History from Kent State University, where he studied with eminent NATO and Jeffersonian era diplomatic historian Lawrence S. Kaplan. His doctorate is in English Literature from the University of South Florida, where he studied with noted film and literature scholar Phillip Sipiora, the founding editor of The Mailer Review. Bob and his wife, antiques and vintage expert Suzette Percival. owner of Spot of Vintage, live in North Carolina and have two wonderful college-aged daughters.