Jamie Allen is the creator and writer behind the Squirrel Census, a design, science, conceptual art, and storytelling project. Started in Atlanta in 2012, the five-person Squirrel Census team led the first-ever complete count of Eastern gray squirrels in New York City’s Central Park in 2018. The results were published in the Central Park Squirrel Census 2019 Report. In 2022, the Census released squirrel data, stories, jokes, songs, and other tidbits of entertainment through a 1-800 number (833-NYC-SQRL).
Jamie is also a contributing writer to Atlanta Magazine, and he has published essays, short stories, and humor in outlets including McSweeney's, Eyeshot, The Paris Review’s “The Daily,” The Oxford American, The Missouri Review, The Morning News, Garden & Gun, Creative Loafing, Salon, Slate, New South, and many others. His novel, The Dashing Diner, was independently published in November 2024, and his feature-comedy script, Double Ds, was a semifinalist in 2024 Austin Film Festival screenwriting contest. While living in Los Angeles, he served as Head Writer for the Pocket FM fantasy-drama-comedy Norse Code, a 550-episode scripted audio show that was the top-performing original on the app in 2024. In the 1990s, he was the first Senior Writer ever for CNN.com, creating multimedia feature pieces on film, TV, music, and literary personalities at a time when the foundation of storytelling on the Internet was still in its infancy.
Jamie is certified by a regional plant-nursery chain on chainsaw, forklift, leaf blower, table hammer, paint brush, pallet jack, watering can, and other manual labor tools. Additionally, he has received his certificate to substitute teach at the high school level. In his spare time, he studies the pronunciation of the word “baby” in popular music.
