This site features some of my freelance articles and photographs. I have lived in central Pennsylvania, Chicago, and southern California, and traveled to overseas destinations including Venezuela, Chile, England, Germany, Wales, and China for a broad perspective of different places. I have experience in technical writing (both business and scientific), travel writing, and much more. I am a current contributor to MSN City Guides. For details please feel free to contact me at farronb@farronbrougher.com.

Some people think it's easier to write a 1,000 page novel than a short, vivid story. I haven't written the novel yet, but I have done some short pieces for MSN City Guides. In less than 200 words, I try to create a compelling snapshot of some place or event. In America's Most Overrated Places I describe Anaheim and an alternative Orange County destination. A second MSN City Guide piece, City Secrets, describes some of Anaheim's "hidden treasures."

I grew up in central Pennsylvania, close to historic cities like York and Lancaster and Gettysburg. The highways and byways of the state are part of my history, and I have enjoyed sharing stories about unusual businesses and places with the readers of Susquehanna Life for the past three years. In the Spring 2007 edition, my story about Pennsylvania Highway 45, also known as the Purple Heart Highway, brought readers along a stretch of road between State College and Lewisburg. The country sometimes seems populated mainly with cookie-cutter franchises that make each town and store numbingly alike, but in Thomas Brothers Country Store,I tried to bring to life one of the few remaining "dry goods" stores left in America. Finally, my piece on nostalgic radios back in the Winter 2005 edition also shared a unique and rare business with readers.

Pennsylvania Magazine published my feature about Coyle Lumber, a special 125-year old lumber company unlike the big "industrial" lumberyards most people know.

I don't usually write about food and dining, but The Pub and Restaurant in Gettysburg offered a unique mix of history and food that I thought Susquehanna Life readers would enjoy learning about. You can read about Dining Out with History; stop by during your next visit to Gettysburg.






Personal interests in aviation, photography, and antique maps keep me occupied when I'm not working on writing assignments. Many of my photographs accompany my articles, and my black and white photograph of an old abandoned desert motel (left) received an Honorable Mention in the 2003 State of California photo contest. I volunteer on a team working on an exciting project at Cal State Fullerton to digitize an outstanding collection of antique maps at the University. Cal State Fullerton's magazine published an article on that work (The Boswell Project). A first-person account of my flight in a UAL simulator in Denver is here too. You can also check my blog at Planes, Cameras, and Aviation.