Mr. George Thompson

George F. Thompson (b. 1954) began his book publishing career in 1984, when he joined the Johns Hopkins University Press as an acquisitions editor and established new fields in university press publishing, among them environmental and landscape studies, geography (cultural, historical, and humanistic), landscape photography, planning history, vernacular architecture, and creative non-fiction. In 1990, George founded and still directs the Center for American Places (renamed the Center for the Study of Place in 2007), a non-profit organization whose mission is to enhance our knowledge and understanding of the places and spaces that surround us and influence us in fundamental ways through the development and publication of place-based books and series. In 2011, he started his own imprint, George F. Thompson (GFT) Publishing (www.gftbooks.com). Since 1984, the more than 500 place-based books developed and brought to publication by George, including more than 50 books by Guggenheim Fellows, have won nearly 200 “best-book” awards and honors in more than 35 academic, artistic, and professional fields. In addition, George founded and directed 14 book series, including the acclaimed “Creating the North American Landscape” series (Johns Hopkins University Press, 1989–2006). George is currently finishing his ninth book, An American Place: Landscape Photography and the Ever-Evolving U.S. of A. He is an editor and author of eight other books, including Nature and Cities: The Ecological Imperative in Urban Design and Planning (2016), Chicago Portfolio: Where Geography and Photography Meet (2006), and Landscape in America (1995). George has lived in Virginia’s Shenandoah Valley since 1983.