Leo Gurko

On January 4, 1914, Gurko was born in Warsaw, Poland.[1] During his childhood, Gurko attended schools in New York state, Detroit and Hamtramck, Michigan.[2] While completing his education, Gurko wanted to play baseball for the Detroit Tigers. He later wanted to work in diplomacy, spying and overseas correspondence after reading works by E. Phillips Oppenheim.[3] After completing high school at the age of thirteen, Gurko received a Bachelor of Arts from the College of the City of Detroit in 1931. Gurko later attended the University of Wisconsin during the early 1930s for a Master of Arts and Doctor of Philosophy.[2][4]

Gurko began his career as an editor for G. P. Putnam's Sons in 1934. In 1936, Gurko became a first reader for Macmillan Inc. and stayed with Macmillan until 1962.[1] During this time period, Gurko became an English instructor for Hunter College in 1938. After being promoted to professor, he later became the English division head in 1954 and remained in his executive position until 1960.[4] During his professorship at Hunter, Gurko received a fellowship from Dodd, Mead & Co. for an unpublished version of The Angry Decade in March 1947.[5] The Angry Decade was published later that year and was about the ten-year gap between the Wall Street Crash of 1929 and the attack on Pearl Harbor.[6]

In the 1950s, Gurko released Heroes, Highbrows, and the Popular Mind in 1953.[7] In 1957, Gurko wrote about Thomas Paine with Tom Paine, Freedom's Apostle.[8] The following year, his children's biography on Paine received a Newbery Honor in 1958.[9][10] During the early 1960s, Gurko continued to write biographies with works on Joseph Conrad in 1962 and 1965.[11][12] Apart from Conrad, Gurko put out a book about Ernest Hemingway in 1968 and one on Thomas Wolfe in 1975.[13][14] In 1979, Gurko republished his 1962 Conrad biography with a newly added preface.[15]

Gurko was married and had two children before his death in 2008.[4][16]