I was born in Melrose, Massachusetts, on November 21, 1908. I have lived all my life in New England, and though I love to travel I can't imagine ever calling any other place on earth home. Since I can't remember a time when I didn't intend to write, it is hard to explain why I took so long getting around to it in earnest. But the years seemed to go by very quickly. In 1936 I married Alden Speare and came to Connecticut. Not till both children were in junior high did I find time at last to sit down quietly with a pencil and paper. I turned naturally to the things which had filled my days and thoughts and began to write magazine articles about family living. Then one day I stumbled on a true story from New England history with a character who seemed to me an ideal heroine. Though I had my first historical novel almost by accident it soon proved to be an absorbing hobby." Elizabeth George Speare (1908-1994) won the 1959 Newbery Medal for THE WITCH OF BLACKBIRD POND, and the 1962 Newbery Medal for THE BRONZE BOW. She also received a Newbery Honor Award in 1983, and in 1989 she was presented with the Laura Ingalls Wilder Award for her substantial and enduring contribution to children’s literature.

Leckie was born on December 18, 1920, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He grew up in Rutherford, New Jersey. He began his career as a writer in high school, as a sports writer for ''The Bergen Evening Record'' in Hackensack, New Jersey. On January 18, 1942, Leckie enlisted in the United States Marine Corps.He served in combat in the Pacific theater, as a scout and a machine gunner in H Company, 2nd Battalion 1st Marines Regiment 1st Marine Division (United States). Leckie saw combat in the Battle of Guadalcanal, the Battle of Cape Gloucester, and had been wounded by blast concussion in the Battle of Peleliu. He returned to the United States in March 1945 and was honorably discharged shortly thereafter. Following World War II, Leckie worked as a reporter for the Associated Press, the ''Buffalo Courier-Express'', the ''New York Journal American'', the ''New York Daily News'' and ''The Star-Ledger''. He married Vera Keller, a childhood neighbor, and they had three children: David, Geoff and Joan According to Vera, in 1951 he was inspired to write a memoir after seeing ''South Pacific '' on Broadway and walking out halfway through. He said "I have to tell the story of how it really was. I have to let people know the war wasn't a musical His first and best-selling book, ''Helmet for My Pillow'', a war memoir, was published in 1957. Leckie subsequently wrote more than 40 books on American war history, spanning from the French and Indian War (1754–1763) to Operation Desert Storm (1991). Robert Leckie died on December 24, 2001, after fighting a long battle with Alzheimer's Disease.

Don Whitehead was an American journalist. Among his many awards were the Medal of Freedom, the 1950 George Polk Award for wire service reporting, the 1951 Pulitzer Prize for International Reporting, and the 1952 Pulitzer Prize for National Reporting. He studied at University of Kentucky from 1926 to 1928.He worked for the newspapers Lafollette Press (Harlan, Kentucky), and the Daily Enterprise beginning in 1928 where he covered the Harlan County War. He became a reporter for the Associated Press, in 1935. Whitehead was a combat reporter during World War II.He covered the Eighth Army (United Kingdom) in Egypt, for the AP in September 1942 and then the American Army in Algeria and Tunisia in 1943. He covered the Allied invasion of Sicily in July 1943 with the First Infantry Division. In addition he reported on the Allied invasion of Italy at Salerno in September 1943, the bloody Italian campaign in the fall of that year and the Anzio landings in January 1944. Don Whitehead was on Omaha Beach with the 116th Infantry Regiment on June 6th, 1944 and was present for the Liberation of Paris and the first meeting of American and Russian forces on the Elbe River in May, 1945. All total Don Whitehead made five amphibious landings with assault forces during World War II. He received his first Pulitzer Prize, for international reporting (1951), for his coverage of the early months of the Korean War - where he again experienced months of front line combat. He received his second Pulitzer, for national reporting, in 1953 for his coverage of President Eisenhower's post-election trip to South Korea in 1953. He was Washington bureau chief for the New York Herald Tribune, from 1956 - 1957 and later a columnist for the The Knoxville (Tennessee) News-Sentinel. His book, The FBI Story was adapted into a 1959 film starring James M. Stewart, aka: Jimmy Stewart. His papers are held at the University of Tennessee. Don Whitehead married Marie Patterson on December 20, 1928. They had a daughter, Ruth, and two grandchildren.

Daniel Joseph Boorstin was a historian, professor, attorney, and writer. He was appointed twelfth Librarian of the United States Congress from 1975 until 1987. He graduated from Tulsa's Central High School in Tulsa, Oklahoma, at the age of 15. He graduated with highest honors from Harvard, studied at Balliol College, Oxford as a Rhodes Scholar and earned his PhD at Yale University. He was a lawyer and a university professor at the University of Chicago for 25 years. He also served as director of the National Museum of History and Technology of the Smithsonian Institution. His The Americans The Democratic Experience received the 1974 Pulitzer Prize in history. Within the discipline of social theory, Boorstin’s 1961 book The Image A Guide to Pseudo-events in America is an early description of aspects of American life that were later termed hyperreality and postmodernity. In The Image, Boorstin describes shifts in American culture—mainly due to advertising—where the reproduction or simulation of an event becomes more important or "real" than the event itself. He goes on to coin the term pseudo-event which describes events or activities that serve little to no purpose other than to be reproduced through advertisements or other forms of publicity. The idea of pseudo-events closely mirrors work later done by Jean Baudrillard and Guy Debord. The work is still often used as a text in American sociology courses. When President Gerald Ford nominated Boorstin to be Librarian of Congress, the nomination was supported by the Authors League of America but opposed by the American Library Association because Boorstin "was not a library administrator." The Senate confirmed the nomination without debate. Boorstin died in 2004 in Washington, D.C.