Michelle Mahl Buuck was born and raised in the Faubourg Marigny section of
New Orleans. Her family includes three generations of firefighters; her
grandfather and father retired from the New Orleans Fire Department, and her son
is a St. Bernard Parish firefighter. This, in addition to her years of community
involvement in St. Bernard Parish, gave Buuck the inspiration for her first
Pelican publication, The St. Bernard Fire Department in Hurricane Katrina.
Buuck earned an associate's degree in general studies/social sciences from
Nunez Community College and worked twenty-two years as a senior project
coordinator for M-I SWACO, a global energy services company. For twelve years,
she wrote for the Times-Picayune newspaper in New Orleans, reporting on
community news for St. Bernard Parish, which she had made her home.
Buuck was a popular lecturer in the Nunez Community College History Lecture
Series and also spoke at local schools, libraries, on PEN-TV, and for various
organizations in response to a historical manuscript she completed on the LeBeau
Mansion in St. Bernard Parish. Buuck self-published the manuscript, entitled
A Forgotten Monument, with the help of the college.
She serves as chairman on the Board of Directors of the Nunez Community
College History Lecture Series. Buuck also sits on the Board of Directors of the
Louisiana Institute of Higher Education, Inc. She is happily married to Ted
Buuck, and they are the parents of two children, Caleb and Eden. They reside in
Covington, Louisiana.