John Clinton Hunt (July 24, 1925 – December 30, 2017) was an American writer from the state of

Oklahoma Oklahoma (; Choctaw language, Choctaw: ; chr, ᎣᎧᎳᎰᎹ, ''Okalahoma'' ) is a U.S. state, state in the South Central United States, South Central region of the United States, bordered by Texas on the south and west, Kansas on the nor ...

Early life and education

John Clinton Hunt was born on July 24, 1925, to Henry Hunt and Elizabeth Palmour in

Muskogee, Oklahoma Muskogee () is the thirteenth-largest city in Oklahoma and the county seat of Muskogee County. Home to Bacone College, it lies approximately southeast of Tulsa. The population of the city was 36,878 as of the 2020 census, a 6.0 percent decrease ...

. The family moved to Pawhuska in 1928 and his younger sister, Ann, was born in 1930. On August 11, 1932, his father killed himself. His mother began a relationship with and later married

John Joseph Mathews John Joseph Mathews (November 16, 1894 – June 16, 1979) (Osage) became one of the Osage Nation's most important spokespeople and writers, and served on the Osage Tribal Council during the 1930s. He studied at the University of Oklahoma, Oxf ...

during his childhood. In 1940, Hunt was sent to the Lawrenceville School. Like his step-father, he attended the University of Oklahoma and took a break from school to serve in a World War. In June 1943, he joined the

Marine Corps Reserves The Marine Forces Reserve (MARFORRES or MFR), also known as the United States Marine Corps Reserve (USMCR) and the U.S. Marine Corps Forces Reserve, is the reserve force of the United States Marine Corps. It is the largest command, by assigned pe ...

and in 1946 he was discharged as a second lieutenant. He then finished his degree at Harvard University, where he was an editor of the ''Student Progressive''. He graduated in 1948 and married Barbara Helen Mead in October of that year.

Academic career

In 1950, Hunt joined the faculty at the University of Iowa and taught the

classics Classics or classical studies is the study of classical antiquity. In the Western world, classics traditionally refers to the study of Classical Greek and Roman literature and their related original languages, Ancient Greek and Latin. Classics ...

. He later taught at the Thomas Jefferson School.

CIA career

In 1955, Hunt was recruited by Cord Meyer as a

CIA The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA ), known informally as the Agency and historically as the Company, is a civilian intelligence agency, foreign intelligence service of the federal government of the United States, officially tasked with gat ...

asset. He worked undercover in Europe for the

Congress for Cultural Freedom The Congress for Cultural Freedom (CCF) was an anti-communist advocacy group founded in 1950. At its height, the CCF was active in thirty-five countries. In 1966 it was revealed that the CIA was instrumental in the establishment and funding of the ...

for about a decade. Around 1960, he was the head of the Paris office, but he was forced to resign in 1967.

Writing career

Hunt's first novel was ''Generations of Men'' and was inspired by his upbringing in Pawhuska. The character Hardin Buck was inspired by

. It won the

Spur Award for Best Novel of the West This is a list of the works of fiction which have won the Spur Award for Best Novel of the West: * 1953 - Best Historical Novel: "The Wheel and the Hearth" by Lucia Moore * 1954 - Best Historical Novel: "Journey by the River" by John Prescott * 195 ...

in 1956. His second novel was ''The Grey Horse Legacy'' (1968).

Page Stegner Stuart Page Stegner (born January 31, 1937, in Salt Lake City, Utah, died December 14, 2017, in Reno, Nevada) was a novelist, essayist, and historian who wrote extensively about the American West. He was the son of novelist and historian Wallace S ...

, reviewing for '' The New York Times'', described it as "in both style and conception, a fine work." In 1981, he co-wrote ''Knights Errant'' with Martin Kaplan.

Personal life and death

In 1968 he divorced Barbara and married a Frenchwoman, Chantal Pépin de Bonnerive. In 1985 was the founding chair and president of BioTechnica International until his retirement in 1990. John Clinton Hunt died on December 30, 2017, at the age of 92.

References

Works cited

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Hunt, John Clinton 1925 births 2017 deaths 20th-century American male writers 20th-century American novelists American historical novelists American male novelists Congress for Cultural Freedom Harvard University alumni Iowa Writers' Workshop faculty Mathews family (Osage Nation) Novelists from Oklahoma People from Pawhuska, Oklahoma People of the Central Intelligence Agency United States Marine Corps reservists University of Oklahoma alumni