Justin Gustainis - Biography

Biography

Gustainis was born in Scranton, Pennsylvania and grew up in nearby Pittston, a former coal town on the banks of the Susquehanna River. His upbringing was strict, loving, and very Catholic. After spending the early grades in several schools, in fifth grade he was enrolled in St. John the Evangelist School in Pittston, from which he graduated in 1968.

Gustainis went to college at the University of Scranton, a Jesuit school 12 miles from his home. He commuted for all four years. That means that while the rest of his generation was, apparently, getting high, getting laid and getting crazy, Gustainis was living at home with his parents, who continued to impose curfews on him even as a 21-year-old college Senior.

While earning a degree in Political Science at Scranton, Gustainis was a member of the university's Army ROTC program—of which the first year was mandatory for all students at the (then) all-male institution. Gustainis reluctantly decided to complete whole the four-year program, less out of patriotism than a sense of the inevitability of the draft.

Gustainis was commissioned a Second Lieutenant in the U.S. Army the day before receiving his Bachelor's degree. Later, he went on active duty, to fulfill his service obligation. Details of his military service are not available on the public record.

After being honorably discharged from the Army, Gustainis held a variety of jobs including a brief stint as a professional bodyguard, before returning to school. He earned a Master's degree in English from the University of Scranton and, some years later, a Ph.D. in Communication from Bowling Green State University in Ohio. Along the way, he met and married the love of his life, Patricia Grogan.

After finishing his Ph.D., Gustainis took a one-year faculty appointment at the University of Rhode Island. The next year, he was hired by Plattsburgh State University in upstate New York, part of the SUNY system. He remains there today, as a professor in the Department of Communication Studies.