John McDonnell is an award-winning sports photographer who recently retired from a long career at the Washington Post He grew up in Purcellville Virginia, a small farming town at the time, sitting on the edge of the Blue Ridge Mountains. While in high school, he started working as a photographer for his local weekly paper, The Loudoun Times Mirror in Leesburg Virginia. Since arriving at The Washington Post in the spring of 1978, McDonnell has been involved in every aspect of coverage that the paper provides, with the exception of foreign conflict. He has worked exclusively for the Post’s Style section and Sunday Magazine for most of the 1980’s. Since 1989, McDonnell primarily has photographed for the sports section. He has photographed all of the standard events that a large metropolitan daily sports section covers, the major pro sports teams, NFL, NBA, MLB, NHL, 4 Olympics, plus college and high schools. McDonnell retired from the Washington Post at the at the end of December 2023 after 45 1/2 years at the paper.