John Abbott Lardner (May 4, 1912 – March 24, 1960) was an American sports writer, WW II war correspondent, and

author An author is the writer of a book, article, play, mostly written work. A broader definition of the word "author" states: "''An author is "the person who originated or gave existence to anything" and whose authorship determines responsibility f ...

. He was the son of

Ring Lardner Ringgold Wilmer Lardner (March 6, 1885 – September 25, 1933) was an American sports columnist and short story writer best known for his satirical writings on sports, marriage, and the theatre. His contemporaries Ernest Hemingway, Virginia Wo ...

Career

Lardner attended Phillips Academy, graduating in 1929. After one year at

Harvard Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of higher le ...

, he left for the

Sorbonne Sorbonne may refer to: * Sorbonne (building), historic building in Paris, which housed the University of Paris and is now shared among multiple universities. *the University of Paris (c. 1150 – 1970) *one of its components or linked institution, ...

Paris Paris () is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. S ...

for a year, where he wrote for the ''

International Herald Tribune The ''International Herald Tribune'' (''IHT'') was a daily English-language newspaper published in Paris, France for international English-speaking readers. It had the aim of becoming "the world's first global newspaper" and could fairly be said ...

''. Never finishing his college degree, he elected instead to work for the ''

New York Herald Tribune The ''New York Herald Tribune'' was a newspaper published between 1924 and 1966. It was created in 1924 when Ogden Mills Reid of the ''New-York Tribune'' acquired the ''New York Herald''. It was regarded as a "writer's newspaper" and competed ...

'' from 1931 onward, following in his father’s path as a sports writer. Lardner wrote a weekly column for ''

Newsweek ''Newsweek'' is an American weekly online news magazine co-owned 50 percent each by Dev Pragad, its president and CEO, and Johnathan Davis (businessman), Johnathan Davis, who has no operational role at ''Newsweek''. Founded as a weekly print m ...

'' called "Sport Week" until his death (he had been associated with the magazine since 1939). From 1933 to 1948, he was a sports columnist and war correspondent for the

North American Newspaper Alliance The North American Newspaper Alliance (NANA) was a large newspaper syndicate that flourished between 1922 and 1980. NANA employed some of the most noted writing talents of its time, including Grantland Rice, Joseph Alsop, Michael Stern, Lothrop S ...

. He later became a war correspondent during

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

, dispatching from Europe and Africa. He also deployed with the first American troops to Australia in 1942, and wrote the book ''Southwest Passage'', published in 1943, documenting that experience. In addition, he wrote for the ''

Saturday Evening Post ''The Saturday Evening Post'' is an American magazine, currently published six times a year. It was issued weekly under this title from 1897 until 1963, then every two weeks until 1969. From the 1920s to the 1960s, it was one of the most widely c ...

'', ''

The New Yorker ''The New Yorker'' is an American weekly magazine featuring journalism, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons, and poetry. Founded as a weekly in 1925, the magazine is published 47 times annually, with five of these issues ...

'', ''

The New York Times Magazine ''The New York Times Magazine'' is an American Sunday magazine Supplement (publishing), supplement included with the Sunday edition of ''The New York Times''. It features articles longer than those typically in the newspaper and has attracted man ...

'', and ''

Woman's Home Companion ''Woman's Home Companion'' was an American monthly magazine, published from 1873 to 1957. It was highly successful, climbing to a circulation peak of more than four million during the 1930s and 1940s. The magazine, headquartered in Springfield, O ...

''. Lardner also worked with his brother

Ring Lardner Jr. Ringgold Wilmer Lardner Jr. (August 19, 1915 – October 31, 2000) was an American screenwriter. A member of the "Hollywood Ten", he was blacklisted by the Hollywood film studios during the late 1940s and 1950s after his appearance as an " ...

on film projects and helped support his brother's family when Lardner Jr. was blacklisted by the

Hollywood Hollywood usually refers to: * Hollywood, Los Angeles, a neighborhood in California * Hollywood, a metonym for the cinema of the United States Hollywood may also refer to: Places United States * Hollywood District (disambiguation) * Hollywood, ...

movie studios A film studio (also known as movie studio or simply studio) is a major entertainment company or motion picture company that has its own privately owned studio facility or facilities that are used to make films, which is handled by the production ...

during the

Red Scare A Red Scare is the promotion of a widespread fear of a potential rise of communism, anarchism or other leftist ideologies by a society or state. The term is most often used to refer to two periods in the history of the United States which ar ...

of the late 1940s and 1950s. He served on the Peabody Awards Board of Jurors from 1959 to 1960. Lardner died of a heart attack in March 1960, after years of fighting tuberculosis. Subsequently his friend, the author Roger Kahn, gathered many of his pieces into a book, ''The World of John Lardner''. Another friend, cartoonist

Walt Kelly Walter Crawford Kelly Jr. (August 25, 1913 – October 18, 1973), commonly known as Walt Kelly, was an American animator and cartoonist, best known for the comic strip ''Pogo (comic strip), Pogo''. He began his animation career in 1936 at The Walt ...

, designed the jacket and wrote a preface. Some of Lardner's work was collected into a 2010 book, ''The John Lardner Reader: A Press Box Legend's Classic Sportswriting'', by sports writer John Schulian. Lardner’s papers are located at the

Newberry Library The Newberry Library is an independent research library, specializing in the humanities and located on Washington Square in Chicago, Illinois. It has been free and open to the public since 1887. Its collections encompass a variety of topics rela ...

in Chicago.

Personal life

Lardner, the first son of Ring Lardner and his wife Ellis, was born in

Chicago (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordinates = , coordinates_footnotes = , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name ...

, where his father was writing for the '' Chicago Examiner''. The family moved to the East Coast when he was seven, eventually settling on Long Island, where their friends and neighbors included

Grantland Rice Henry Grantland "Granny" Rice (November 1, 1880July 13, 1954) was an early 20th-century American sportswriter known for his elegant prose. His writing was published in newspapers around the country and broadcast on the radio. Early years Rice wa ...

Franklin Pierce Adams Franklin Pierce Adams (November 15, 1881 – March 23, 1960) was an American columnist known as Franklin P. Adams and by his initials F.P.A.. Famed for his wit, he is best known for his newspaper column, "The Conning Tower", and his appearances a ...

, and

F. Scott Fitzgerald Francis Scott Key Fitzgerald (September 24, 1896 – December 21, 1940) was an American novelist, essayist, and short story writer. He is best known for his novels depicting the flamboyance and excess of the Jazz Age—a term he popularize ...

. He was married to Hazel Hairston and had four children.

References

External links

John Lardner Papers
at

{{DEFAULTSORT:Lardner, John 1912 births 1960 deaths American war correspondents of World War II Writers from Chicago 20th-century American non-fiction writers Sportswriters from Illinois