The Resume

(February 18, 1909-April 13, 1993)
Born in Lake Mills, Iowa
Novelist, historian and environmentalist
Wrote the novels ‘On a Darkling Plain’ (1940), ‘The Big Rock Candy Mountain’ (1943), ‘The Preacher and the Slave’ (1950), ‘A Shooting Star’ (1961), ‘Angle of Repose’ (1972), ‘The Spectator Bird’ (1976) and ‘Crossing to Safety’ (1987)
Nonfiction works include ‘Beyond the Hundredth Meridian: John Wesley Powell and the Second Opening of the West’ (1954), ‘Wilderness Letter’ (1960), ‘The Gathering of Zion: The Story of the Mormon Trail’ (1964), ‘Discovery! The Search for Arabian Oil’ (1971), ‘This Is Dinosaur: Echo Park Country and Its Magic Rivers’ (1985) and ‘On the Teaching of Creative Writing’ (1988)
Founded the creative writing program at Stanford University
Board member of the Sierra Club (1964-66)
Won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction (1972) and National Book Award (1977)
Died of injuries suffered in a car crash on March 28, 1993

Why he might be annoying:

He depicted several residents of Greensboro, Vermont, where he lived part-time, in a less than flattering light in his novel ‘Second Growth’ (1947); many were so offended that he avoided returning to the town for several years.
He turned down a prize from the National Endowment of the Arts to protest the politicization of the NEA (1992).
He opposed the creation of a hiking path near his home in California, but the trail was named after him following his death.

Why he might not be annoying:

He was married to Mary Stuart Page for 59 years.
His ‘Wilderness Letter’ influenced the passage of the Wilderness Act that provided protection to 9.1 million acres of federal land (1964).
Readers of the San Francisco Chronicle voted ‘Angle of Repose’ the best 20th century novel about the American West (1999).

Credit: C. Fishel

Featured in the following Annoying Collections:

• C. Fishel's Profiles [Series 62]
• Guggenheim Fellowship Grant Recipients
• Historians
• I Attended University of Iowa
• I Attended University of Utah
• I Died in 1993 (Ranked: 84)
• I Earned a Doctorate
• I Was an Eagle Scout
• I was Involved in a Car Accident in 1993
• Look at My Typewriter
• Modern Library's 100 Best Novels of the 20th Century [1998] (Ranked: 82)
• Profiles 38001-38250 (Ranked: 38016)
• We Celebrated Our Golden Anniversary

Year In Review:

In 2023, Out of 1 Votes: 0% Annoying
In 2022, Out of 5 Votes: 40.0% Annoying
In 2021, Out of 9 Votes: 88.89% Annoying
In 2020, Out of 6 Votes: 16.67% Annoying
In 2017, Out of 4 Votes: 50.0% Annoying
In 2016, Out of 34 Votes: 82.35% Annoying