Top 10 Substack Writers are Past 80

What can you learn and what do they have in common?

Dan Rather

Compound money and what do you have? Wealth.

Compound creativity and what do you have? SuperAgers with successful Substack publications.

Neuroscience research for 30 years confirmed that creative practice isn’t merely protective for the brain, it actively builds cognitive capacity throughout life. SuperAgers scored better on memory tests than 55-year-olds, learned new skills as quickly as people in their 40s, and maintained sharp thinking under pressure.

What’s most fascinating is that SuperAgers don’t just keep up with younger adults—in some areas, they actually perform better.

That’s why my top ten Substack writers are in their 80’s and beyond. That’s why you may want to look at the power of their prose and the secrets of life folded into their paragraphs.

Today we will cover these bases with you:

Who are these Top Ten past 80?

What do they have in common?

What can you learn from them and use immediately?

Abigail Thomas, Photo by Jennifer Waddell

Top Ten Substacks, Authors Beyond 80

What Comes Next?, Abigail Thomas, former literary agent and author of novels, poetry, and memoirs. She taught writing at New School University and Queens University. She does not pitch writing courses, but if you are lucky, you will spot a rare opportunity when a colleague convinces Abigail to collaborate on a workshop or writing retreat. She writes about living with dogs, friendship, the value of nature, and no longer caring about bullshit.

Steady, Dan Rather, former CBS Evening News anchor. He launched “Steady” in 2021, and it has since become one of the most popular newsletters on the platform, focusing on a “calm and steady” approach to the news. Dan said, The world is a big, beautiful, complicated, sometimes tragic, often joyful place. As a Steady reader, you get access to his real-time thoughts as you walk with Dan through a tough, yet hopeful juncture of history.

Must Tilt Windmills, Susan O’Brien, architect, poet, artist, gardener, writer, and creator of original yard signs when it comes to protesting and giving a voice to We The People. These stories are a journey into the future, day by day. Most of the time, she suspects that something old is masquerading as new, and she gives you context to make sense of “unprecedented.”

Seymour Hersh, Seymour Hersh. What can you learn as a regular reader of this Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative journalist who is relentless in his pursuit of truth and belief in challenging the official narrative? It seems like we need this more than ever, and Seymour shows you what courage looks like.

Thyme, Place & Story, Susan Wittig Albert. She gathers readers in her Substack to consider what we know about living in place, growing green, growing older, reading, writing, and publishing in an era of new technologies. Best-selling, award-winning books are to her credit, much like other writers in their 80’s with dynamite Substack publications.

The Granny Who Stands on Her Head, Ann Richardson. This book author has energy and enthusiasm you desire at any age. Some posts speak to elders, and some speak directly to something stimulating, something amusing, and something you never thought about. Topics range from Annunciation to orgasms. Never will AI train on either of those.

Joyce Carol Oates: A Writer’s Journal, Joyce Carol Oates. Yes, that famous novelist with 58 novels, plays, and children’s books. Her Substack is a digital journal, sharing everything from unpublished poems to insights on her daily life and literary influences.

Reinvent Yourself, Blue. She is a storyteller who shows you how to celebrate courage, community, and the quiet magic of synchronicity, not as grand theories but as lived experiences. She reimagines aging as expansion, not limitation. Better than articles that talk at you or past you (AI does that), Blue produces real-life stories of reinvention and resilience.

Gifted Professionals and Communicators, Georgia Patrick. It’s a private member community--a safe space, and publication for professionals from 45 to 90 who think fast, feel deep, and never quite fit. It emphasizes storytelling, like it has worked for thousands of years before marketing people bastardized it and threw us off the scent. It’s the place for individuals to look for clues and track down the story lines that need to come out to show their compassionate insights into the reality behind their exceptional talents.

Constant Commoner and Writer Everlasting, Ramona Grigg. That’s right, two Substack publications that deliver the benefit of 40 years as a writer, teacher, editor, and Everyday Genius (TM) with an excellent bullshit sniffer and wisdom found only in survivors and super agers.

In June, we will add Robert Reich Substack, Robert Reich, to the Top 80’s Writers. His 80th birthday is in June, and you need to include him now in your daily reading. He is former U.S. Secretary of Labor, retired professor, and author. He has been a consistent voice on Substack for several years, often providing educational breakdowns of complex economic issues.

Credit Sergey Zolkin

What Do These Substack Leaders Have In Common?

They were born during World War II. They are the best storytellers because they have a context of lived experience in the most productive, prosperous, innovative, internationally secure, and opportunity-rich period of American history.

They defined cultures and movements. They fought in Vietnam or protested. They are still on the front lines of pointing out the difference between truth and lies, between justice and corruption. Even in wheelchairs and walkers, they still fight to keep the America they’ve known for 80 years, i.e., the We The People version of democracy.

They love words and people. They know how to treat both with respect. They have been writing every day since grade school. Some became famous authors after 40 and some became Substack sensations recently.

All of them did a lot of writing in the decades of their professional paths and sequence of pivots and transitions to where they are today. They did all of that writing before AI. They still do a great job of engaging the reader and enriching lives with their stories, and without AI.

Do you want a master class on writing and how to succeed with Substack--or life? Read their articles, and if they have published books, read those too. They don’t tell you what to do. They just do it in front of you, every day. Speaking of daily writing, isn’t that the first hot tip for Substack success that you get from everyone with a tattoo, nose ring, and screenshots of their latest earnings is this: They say stop consuming, start writing every day and keep writing.

Are you writing every day and posting when you can? If not, then you are not keeping up with most of these favorite Substack writers.

Is it only about writing? No. It’s about learning from others and learning from your own shitty first drafts. They form friendships of mutual support with other writers and stuff their ego. Do it in person, not behind a keyboard and screen. Ask for critique. Swap out time as each other’s editor.

These are my peers. We don’t need an online course or YouTube video with writing tips and hacks. We are fully engaged with life and eager to learn from others how to write well. We are never done learning. We learn by reading each other’s work and communicating directly with each other--by phone and email.

We are curious and interested in the environment, which includes personal space, networks (5,000+) of personal friends and business colleagues we have met in person, our neighborhood community, nature, and world cultures. Sure, we know about social media and AI, but we do not need it. We are ruthless with our remaining time, and that’s why we don’t give a flying fig about what others think. Most of us have a cell phone, but we leave it on the desk or in the room where the landline used to be. Scrolling is not a thing for us. Remembering where we put the car keys is more important.

Credit Marco Palumbo on Unsplash

What can you learn by subscribing to them and reading everything they post?

1. This is what creativity looks like. Curiosity, creativity, love, and grief--these are superpowers. AI will never know any of it.

2. This is storytelling. Not articles or essays, but storytelling the way it was done as the primary means of communication, even before the invention of paper.

3. There’s no AI here. They have always been a step ahead of everyone and are technology aware but not slaves. Get to know them and notice they don’t scroll or have apps. Their source of inspiration and brilliance comes from conversations with other humans and immersion in nature, the arts, books, and communities that want to learn from them and don’t bore them.

4. People subscribe to them because it’s real, authentic and makes them feel something. They don’t have a marketing plan or sales funnel. They don’t need anyone’s approval. They are letter writers by nature and appreciate comments that sound like a letter from a friend. They don’t know about keyboard shortcuts, but they are masters of the DELETE key. They know, better than you, life is too short and precious to waste on anything less than kind and collaborative.

5. Words sustain them and nourish them. Many of them have purchased and given away more books than you find at a local branch library. They are the original Frequent Buyers at Barnes and Noble. Yes, before Amazon, founded 1994, there were 1,900 bookstores and 1,900 libraries. Most houses built before 1950 had libraries. After that, houses had a main room for media, including books, magazines, television, stereo systems, record albums (vinyl), and stacks of tape recordings, then cassettes, then CDs. These writers learned their searching skills in rooms full of catalogue cards, so keyword search on a computer was just a faster way to do the same thing.

Writing Power That Lasts

In her post this week What Writing Bravely Means Today, Linda Caroll revealed that more than 14,000 Substacks have been abandoned. Who are these writers who start and cannot sustain? I checked my top ten to make sure they were all still alive and striving. My favorites are going strong and subscribers find their way to them, organically. Most of all, I admire their tenacity, dedication to their craft, plus lessons for writing and what it means to be human, because they write and show up every day.

We’re on a mission to feature stories about professionals who are initiating meaningful conversations with other gifted minds and storytellers—and who they serve.

My clients are experts who don’t need more information. They need decisions and a system that matches their brain to turn ideas into stories and stories into NOW results. Not “someday” and not “after I feel ready.” Start with my Contact page to see how this works and the path forward for you.