George Thurston Leite (December 20, 1920 – August 6, 1985) was an American author, poet, publisher, bookstore, gallery, and native plants nursery owner active in California's

San Francisco Bay Area The San Francisco Bay Area, often referred to as simply the Bay Area, is a populous region surrounding the San Francisco, San Pablo, and Suisun Bay estuaries in Northern California. The Bay Area is defined by the Association of Bay Area Go ...

starting in the 1940s. Born to a

Portuguese-American Portuguese Americans ( pt, português-americanos), also known as Luso-Americans (''luso-americanos''), are citizens and residents of the United States who are connected to the country of Portugal by birth, ancestry, or citizenship. Americans and ...

family in Providence, Rhode Island in 1920, he was raised in

San Leandro, California San Leandro (Spanish for " St. Leander") is a city in Alameda County, California, United States. It is located in the East Bay of the San Francisco Bay Area; between Oakland to the northwest, and Ashland, Castro Valley, and Hayward to the sou ...

, a Bay Area city which was then a Portuguese enclave. He died in 1985 in

Walnut Creek, California Walnut Creek is a city in Contra Costa County, California, United States, located in the East Bay region of the San Francisco Bay Area, about east of the city of Oakland. With a total population of 70,127 per the 2020 census, Walnut Creek ser ...

. Leite was the founder of

daliel's Bookstore daliel's Gallery (stylized with a lowercase 'd', and sometimes just 'daliel') was a display and performance space in the San Francisco Bay Area in California in the 1940s and 1950s; the building also contained daliel's Bookstore. George Leite ...

(stylized with a lowercase 'd') at 2466

Telegraph Avenue Telegraph Avenue is a street that begins, at its southernmost point, in the midst of the historic downtown district of Oakland, California, and ends, at its northernmost point, at the southern edge of the University of California, Berkeley campu ...

between Dwight and Haste Streets in

Berkeley Berkeley most often refers to: *Berkeley, California, a city in the United States **University of California, Berkeley, a public university in Berkeley, California * George Berkeley (1685–1753), Anglo-Irish philosopher Berkeley may also refer ...

, where he published '' Circle Magazine'' and published books, pamphlets, and audio recordings under the Circle Editions imprint. Many of the important regional writers of the period such as

Kenneth Rexroth Kenneth Charles Marion Rexroth (1905–1982) was an American poet, translator, and critical essayist. He is regarded as a central figure in the San Francisco Renaissance, and paved the groundwork for the movement. Although he did not consider h ...

were published by him, and

daliel's Gallery daliel's Gallery (stylized with a lowercase 'd', and sometimes just 'daliel') was a display and performance space in the San Francisco Bay Area in California in the 1940s and 1950s; the building also contained daliel's Bookstore. George Leite ...

was the site of concerts by composer

Harry Partch Harry Partch (June 24, 1901 – September 3, 1974) was an American composer, music theorist, and creator of unique musical instruments. He composed using scales of unequal intervals in just intonation, and was one of the first 20th-century com ...

and exhibitions by artist

Jean Varda Jean "Yanko" Varda (11 September 1893 – 10 January 1971) was an American artist, best known for his collage work. Varda was one of the early adopters of the Sausalito houseboat lifestyle that was popular in the 1960s–1970s. He was the subj ...

. He lived for a while near Henry Miller's cabin on the Big Sur coast. Leite and novelist Jody Scott co-authored the novel ''cure it with honey'' (AKA ''I'll Get Mine)'' under the pseudonym Thurston Scott. It was published in 1951 and won the Mystery Writers of America Edgar Award for best first novel in 1952.

References

External links

Circle History
from Varda's ferryboat's website {{DEFAULTSORT:Leite, George 20th-century American poets Businesspeople from Providence, Rhode Island Businesspeople from the San Francisco Bay Area Writers from Providence, Rhode Island Poets from Rhode Island Writers from the San Francisco Bay Area 1920 births 1985 deaths American people of Portuguese descent American male poets 20th-century American businesspeople 20th-century American male writers