Name Charles Pellegrino | Role Writer | |
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Education Victoria University of Wellington Parents John Pellegrino, Jane Pellegrino Nominations Locus Award for Best Science Fiction Novel, Locus Award for Best First Novel Books The Last Train from Hiroshima, The Killing Star, The Jesus Family Tomb, Unearthing Atlantis, Ghosts of the Titanic Similar People George Zebrowski, James Cameron, Gary Habermas, Christie Golden, Gene DeWeese | ||
Charles R. Pellegrino (born 1953) is an American writer and the author of several books related to science and archaeology, including Return to Sodom and Gomorrah, Ghosts of the Titanic, Unearthing Atlantis and Ghosts of Vesuvius. Pellegrino's book The Last Train from Hiroshima was published in 2010, but errors in the book prompted the publisher to withdraw the book within a few months. Investigation also showed that Pellegrino falsely claimed to have earned a PhD.
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Early life
Pellegrino earned bachelor's and master's degrees at Long Island University in the mid-1970s.
Last Train from Hiroshima
In January 2010, Henry Holt published Pellegrino's Last Train from Hiroshima, a look at the nuclear bombing of Hiroshima from the vantage of survivors.
The New York Times initially praised the book as "sober and authoritative" and as a "firm and compelling synthesis of earlier memoirs and archival material". Nevertheless, a month later the New York Times questioned claims made in Pellegrino's book:
[The book] claims to reveal a secret accident with the atom bomb that killed one American and irradiated others and greatly reduced the weapon’s destructive power… There is just one problem. That section of the book and other technical details of the mission are based on the recollections of Joseph Fuoco, who is described as a last-minute substitute on one of the two observation planes that escorted the Enola Gay… But Mr. Fuoco… never flew on the bombing run, and he never substituted for James R. Corliss, the plane’s regular flight engineer, Mr. Corliss’s family says. They, along with angry ranks of scientists, historians and veterans, are denouncing the book and calling Mr. Fuoco an impostor.
Veterans of the 509th Operations Group, the Air Force unit which dropped the atomic bombs, issued a detailed list of substantive problems with many of the book's claims about the bomb and the Air Force personnel involved.
The New York Times added, "Facing a national outcry and the Corliss family’s evidence, the author, Charles Pellegrino, now concedes that he was probably duped. . . . [H]e said he would rewrite sections of the book for paperback and foreign editions." Despite Pellegrino's claim in The New York Times that he had been "duped" by Fuoco, further investigation revealed that Pellegrino had repeatedly mentioned one of the book's most disputed claims (a supposed fatal accident at Tinian Island on 4 August 1945) before Mr. Fuoco had allegedly confided it for him. Doubts also arose about the existence of two westerners allegedly present in Hiroshima at the time of the bombing.
On 1 March 2010, Henry Holt announced it had halted publication of Last Train from Hiroshima.
A new version of "Last Train from Hiroshima" retitled as "To Hell and Back" was released in 2015.
Doctoral degree
Pellegrino claims to have received a Ph.D. at Victoria University of Wellington in New Zealand in 1982. After doubts about the degree were raised, Victoria University spokespersons informed the Associated Press, The Weekly Standard, and The New York Times that Pellegrino did not have a Ph.D. from Victoria University.
Pellegrino responded that the university had "stripped him of his Ph.D. because of a disagreement over evolutionary theory". The university told The New York Times and other news outlets that it would further investigate the matter. In 2010, The New York Times reported:
In an e-mailed statement, Professor Pat Walsh, vice chancellor of Victoria University of Wellington, confirmed that Mr. Pellegrino had been a Ph.D. student in the 1980s. "He submitted a thesis which in the unanimous opinion of the examiners was not of a sufficient standard for a Ph.D. to be awarded," Mr. Walsh said. "Following complaints from Pellegrino, an investigation was carried out by the University. In 1986, Pellegrino appealed to Her Majesty the Queen. The case was then considered by the Governor-General who disallowed the appeal. Accordingly, Pellegrino was never awarded a Ph.D. from Victoria and therefore could not have had it stripped from him or reinstated at a later date."
Works
The Jesus Family Tomb: The Discovery, the Investigation, and the Evidence That Could Change History (2007) (co-authored with Simcha Jacobovici) was a companion book to the Discovery Channel documentary on the same subject created in part by film director James Cameron.