Historical records matching John Monk Saunders
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About John Monk Saunders
John Monk Saunders (November 22, 1897 – March 11, 1940) was an American novelist, screenwriter, and film director.
biography
From John Monk Saunders: Something in the Air
For those who cherish the too often obscure names of screenwriters, Saunders is forever identified with aviation on film. As the author of ten films that dealt with pilot's experiences in The Great War (WWI to you and me), Saunders might be considered an authority in that field. Yet when the Armistice came in 1918, he was stationed in Florida training others to be pilots for the first aerial war. On that November night, Saunders would later recall, he went out alone onto the airfield and wept, his head resting on the wing of his plane. His grief was due to the fact that he'd never be a part of the experience that he'd hoped to share with others as a possible air ace. He never knew warfare except second hand, unless, of course, one counts the conflict that raged inside him during his brief life.
Born in Minnesota in 1895, he was the well-born son of a prominent federal attorney who grew up in the Seattle, Washington area. Attending the University of Washington when he joined the Air Service, he earned his degree, a Rhodes Scholarship to Oxford and eventually found his way back to New York, where he became a reporter for the New York Tribune in the early '20s. ... Like Fitzgerald, Saunders was also strikingly handsome before becoming dissipated, an educated man and a gifted storyteller whose bitterness reflected the self-destructive impulses of the generation who'd come of age during the First World War.
An early broken marriage to Avis Hughes, (a step-daughter to Rupert Hughes, a once famed prolific writer himself and Howard Hughes' uncle) was followed by a headlong pursuit of literary notoriety and the fame and money that went with it in some circles. His sale of his popular short story "A Maker of Gestures", first published in Cosmopolitan magazine to Famous Players-Lasky Pictures in the mid-twenties, introduced Saunders to the hurly-burly of Hollywood in the '20s. Saunders' second marriage to the luminous young actress, Fay Wray, who had already appeared in films directed by von Stroheim, Wellman, and De Mille long before her encounter with King Kong, may have been instrumental in the writer's ongoing success socially and professionally. Wray would find herself increasingly intimidated by her husband in private, but as a hostess and a companion, she often intervened to mollify those irked by her husband's sometimes erratic behavior.
While Fay Wray went on to a different kind of immortality in small and large roles, (one memorable one opposite a certain King Kong comes to mind), she had a daughter Susan by John Monk Saunders at a time when their marriage was at its most precarious. A series of attempted reconciliations and separations culminated in a period when Saunders "injected [Fay Wray] with drugs while she slept, sold their house and pocketed the cash, sold their furniture to an antiques dealer and disappeared with their baby daughter. Miss Wray had made half a million dollars during the 11 years they were married. He had made half a million, too. Nothing was left."
Hospitalized again for treatment, Fay Wray sadly began divorce proceedings after an eleven year marriage in 1939. The following year he hung himself.
- Reference: Ancestry Genealogy - SmartCopy: Aug 22 2016, 8:05:46 UTC
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Monk_Saunders
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Monk_Saunders
John Monk Saunders (November 22, 1897 - March 11, 1940) was an American novelist, screenwriter and film director.
Early life and career
Born in Hinckley, Minnesota, Saunders received his education at University of Washington in Seattle and then was a Rhodes Scholar. He later served in the Air Service during World War I as a flight instructor in Florida, but was never able to secure a posting to France, a disappointment that frustrated him for the remainder of his life.
His screenwriting credits include Wings (1927), The Last Flight (which he adapted from his own novel Single Lady), and The Conquest of the Air (1936), which he also directed. Wings (1927), was the first film to ever win a Best Picture Academy award on May 16, 1929. He won an Oscar for Best Story for the writing of The Dawn Patrol.
Personal life
Saunders was married first to Avis Hughes from 1922 to 1927 then to the actress Fay Wray from 1928 to 1939, with whom he had a daughter, Susan.
Death
After battling poor health, Saunders hanged himself at his Fort Myers, Florida home in March 1940.
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John Monk Saunders's Timeline
| 1895 |
November 22, 1895
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Hinckley, Pine County, Minnesota, United States
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| 1940 |
March 11, 1940
Age 44
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Fort Myers, Lee County, Florida, United States
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March 11, 1940
Age 44
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Evington, Campbell County, Virginia, United States
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