John Cullen Murphy, Jr. (born September 1, 1952) is an American writer, journalist and editor who was managing editor of The Atlantic magazine from 1985–2006. He was born in New Rochelle, New York, in 1952, a son of illustrator and cartoonist John Cullen Murphy. He grew up in Greenwich, Connecticut. He was educated at Amherst College, from which he graduated with honors in medieval history in 1974. Murphy's first magazine job was in the paste-up department of Change, a magazine devoted to higher education.