Merle Miller

==Life and career==
Merle Miller was born in [[Montour, Iowa]], and raised in [[Marshalltown, Iowa]], attending the University of Iowa and the London School of Economics. Before World War II, he was a Washington correspondent for the late Philadelphia Record. During the war, Miller served both in the Pacific and in Europe as a war correspondent and editor for ''[[Yank, The Army Weekly]]''.

Following his discharge from the Army, he was editor of both ''Harper'' and ''Time'' magazines. He also worked as a book reviewer for ''The Saturday Review of Literature'' and as a contributing editor for ''The Nation''. His work appeared frequently in the ''New York Times Magazine''.

During the course of a writing career that spanned several decades, Miller wrote numerous novels, including the best-selling classic post war novel, ''That Winter'' (1948). His other novels are ''Island 49'' (1945); ''The Sure Thing'' (1949); ''Reunion'' (1954); ''A Day in Late September'' (1956); ''A Secret Understanding'' (1956); ''A Gay and Melancholy Sound'' (1961); and ''What Happened'' (1972). He also wrote the novel ''The Warm Feeling'', but since the publisher did not give him the opportunity to read and edit the manuscript, he publicly disowned the novel and would not have anything to do with it.<ref>Merle Miller Disowns His New Novel by Harry Gilroy. The New York Times. March 27, 1968.</ref>

His works of non-fiction include ''We Dropped the A-Bomb'' (1946), a book he wrote in collaboration with Abe Spitzer, a radioman who was on the bomber [[The Great Artiste]], one of the three B-29s that dropped the atom bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki; ''The Judges and The Judged'' (1952); ''Only You Dick Daring'' (1964), Miller's scathing account of trying to make a show with CBS for the 1963-1964 television season; and ''On Being Different: What It Means To Be a Homosexual'' (1971). Miller was a contributor to ''A Treasury of Great Reporting''; ""The Best of Yank''; and ''Yank: The GI Story of the War''.

In 1967 he signed the "[[Writers and Editors War Tax Protest]]," vowing to refuse to pay taxes raised to fund the [[Vietnam War]].<ref>{{cite web|url=http://collection1.libraries.psu.edu/cdm4/document.php?CISOROOT=/transaction&CISOPTR=14675&CISOSHOW=14671 |title=Letter from Ronald, September 8, 1967 :: Transaction-Horowitz Archive |publisher=Collection1.libraries.psu.edu |date=September 8, 1967 |accessdate=December 5, 2013}}</ref>

Miller wrote many television plays and was the author of the screenplays, "The Rains of Ranchiphur" (1955), which starred [[Richard Burton]] and [[Lana Turner]], and "Kings Go Forth," (1958), featuring [[Frank Sinatra]] and [[Natalie Wood]]. He wrote several drafts of a screenplay for "A Walk on the Wild Side," but by the time the screen version was being shot it was so far removed from what he had written or had in mind that he refused any screen credit.<ref>Merle Miller's journals and other writings. 1936 to 1986. The Estate of Merle Miller. Carol V. Hanley, Executrix.</ref> His postwar career as a television script writer and novelist was interrupted by the advent of [[Senator Joseph McCarthy]] and Miller's inclusion on the "Blacklist." He did not re-enter TV until the late 1950s and early 60s.<ref name=Sex/>

After the success of ''Plain Speaking'' Miller wrote two more biographies, ''Lyndon, A Biography of President Lyndon Baines Johnson'', and ''Ike the Soldier'', a biography of General Dwight David Eisenhower. He had completed all the interviews and research with the intention of writing a second volume, to be titled ''Ike the President'', but died just after finishing the first volume Ike the Soldier.

Miller died on June 10, 1986, in Danbury Hospital in Connecticut, from peritonitis following surgery to remove a ruptured appendix.

Merle Miller Special Collections containing all of his taped interviews, research material, notes and correspondence are housed at three presidential libraries in Missouri, Texas and Kansas, as well as the University of Iowa and Boston University. They are all open and available to the public.<ref>Lyndon Baines Johnson Library and Museum. Research Collection. Austin, Texas; Eisenhower Presidential Library. Abilene, Kansas; Harry S. Truman Library and Museum, Independence, Missouri; Howard Gottlieb Archival Research Center, Boston University; University of Iowa Library Manuscript Register.</ref>