Ernest Hemingway

The man who would become one of the greatest American novelists, journalists and travelles of the 20th century, was born into a comfortable suburban family. Ernest Miller Hemingway was born on July 21, 1899 in Oak Park, Illinois, a suburb of Chicago. He was the second child born to Clarence Edmonds "Doc Ed" Hemingway - a country doctor, and Grace Hall Hemingway. Hemingway's father attended the birth of Ernest and blew a horn on his front porch to announce to the neighbours that his wife had given birth to their first boy. The Hemingways lived in a six-bedroom Victorian house built by Ernest's widowed maternal grandfather, Ernest Miller Hall, an English immigrant and Civil War veteran who lived with the family. Hemingway's mother once aspired to a career as an opera singer, and she earned money by giving voice and music lessons. She was said to be domineering and narrowly religious, in keeping with the strict Protestant ethic of Oak Park, which Hemingway later said had "wide lawns and narrow minds". While his mother hoped that her son would develop an interest in music, Hemingway adopted his father's outdoorsman hobbies of hunting, fishing and camping in the woods and lakes of Northern Michigan. The family owned a summer home called Windemere on Walloon Lake, near Petoskey, Michigan, and often spent summers holidaying there. These early experiences in close contact with nature instilled in Hemingway a lifelong passion for outdoor adventure and for living in remote or isolated areas. Hemingway attended Oak Park and River Forest High School from September 1913 until his graduation in June 1917. He excelled both academically and athletically - he boxed, played American football, and displayed particular talent in English classes. His first writing experience was writing for "Trapeze" and "Tabula" (the school's newspaper and yearbook, respectively) in his junior year, and went on to serve as editor in his senior year. He sometimes wrote under the pen name of Ring Lardner, Jr., a nod to his literary hero Ring Lardner. After high school, Hemingway did not want to go to college. Instead, at the age of 18, he began his writing career as a cub reporter for The Kansas City Star. Although he worked at the newspaper for only six months (October 17, 1917-April 30, 1918), throughout his lifetime he used the guidance of the Star's style guide as a foundation for his writing style: "Use short sentences. Use short first paragraphs. Use vigorous English. Be positive, not negative," he later recalled.