Pulitzer Prize winner Richard Ford is born
On this day in 1944 novelist Richard Ford is born in Jackson Mississippi.The son of a traveling salesman Ford lost his father when he was 16.He graduated from Michigan State University where he met his wife Kristina who became a city planner.After a stint at law school Ford dropped out and took a masters degree in English.
He published his first novel A Piece of My Heart about the journey of two men in the South in 1976.In 1981 he published a second novel The Ultimate Good Luck.Meanwhile he taught at Williams College and Princeton University but when neither of his novels met with great success he became a sportswriter at age 37.
He turned his experiences into his breakthrough novel The Sportswriter (1986).In 1996 he won the Pulitzer Prize for The Sportswriters sequel Independence Day.
