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Famous Writers in SB
updated: Mar 22, 2013, 10:55 AM

By Edhat Subscriber

Beryl Markham was a remarkable author who lived for a time in Santa Barbara. Who else in the past was an acclaimed author from Santa Barbara?

Comments in order of when they were received | (reverse order)

BURNTTHISTLE	2013-03-22 11:05 AM
Aldous Huxley
COMMENT 388267	2013-03-22 11:17 AM
Richard Henry Dana, Jr. spent some time here before writing "Two Years Before the Mast."
SBSURFERLIFE	2013-03-22 11:17 AM
Sue Grafton, TC Boyle
COMMENT 388271	2013-03-22 11:24 AM
AH lectured here and visited for cure, but never lived here.
COMMENT 388276	2013-03-22 11:29 AM
Douglas Adams, Ashleigh Brilliant, Ernest Thayer,
PAMSB	2013-03-22 11:31 AM
Fannie Flagg, Barnaby Conrad, Julia Child
ROGER DODGER	2013-03-22 11:54 AM
Beryl Ives, Margaret Millar, her Husband Ross McDonald, Michael Butler..
COMMENT 388296	2013-03-22 11:55 AM
Sandy Armstrong
COMMENT 388301	2013-03-22 12:07 PM
Allan Folsum lives here
COMMENT 388303	2013-03-22 12:11 PM
Beryl Markham, pilot and author of West With The Night. She was also a friend of Karen Blixen whilst living in Africa.
COMMENT 388306	2013-03-22 12:21 PM
Lee Wardlaw
COMMENT 388328	2013-03-22 12:32 PM
Wow, nobody mentioned Ray Bradbury yet.
REXOFSB	2013-03-22 12:50 PM
I don't think Ray Bradbury ever lived here. He attended the Writer's Conference a lot, but I'm pretty sure he always lived in LA.
COMMENT 388359	2013-03-22 01:12 PM
Phil McCrevis
COMMENT 388366	2013-03-22 01:21 PM
Anne Landers
COMMENT 388369	2013-03-22 01:26 PM
Peter Sklar.
COMMENT 388390	2013-03-22 01:57 PM
T.C. Boyle
COMMENT 388396	2013-03-22 02:11 PM
Raghavan and Pico Iyer
COMMENT 388410	2013-03-22 02:24 PM
dean koontz lives here.
PAMSB	2013-03-22 02:25 PM
Dean Koontz lives in Orange County and Ray Bradbury lived in Venice.
ILIKECAKE	2013-03-22 03:36 PM
@369...right on, he impacted me more than all the others combined.
COMMENT 388453P	2013-03-22 03:50 PM
I wondered if Koontz had connections here. I have read all of his books and many of them refer to places on the central coast. I've read Santa Barbara and Ventura specifically mentioned in at least 5 or 6 of his books. BTW, he is clearly a dog lover (and has made quite a positive impact on this cat lover) that golden lovers/owners would probably enjoy reading.
COMMENT 388461	2013-03-22 04:10 PM
ILIKECAKE, I'm not sure how much software he wrote. I think he's the Steve Jobs of Edhat. Great visionary and administrator, but he had staff working under him that gets credit too.
COMMENT 388472	2013-03-22 04:25 PM
TC Boyle not only lives in (and writes about) our local area, he actually lives in a Frank Lloyd Wright house. Interesting stuff.
COMMENT 388507	2013-03-22 05:38 PM
Donald Culross Peattie I delivered his paper on Glendessary Lane in 1949 or 50. Before the days that Mission Canyon and Foothill and Glendessary were no longer bicycle routes. Threw the paper over the wall and never really saw the house. Office pay so I didn't collect from him. Quite a famous writer and naturalist at the time with a lot of books to his credit. Read about him on wikipedia. Obvious lots of $$$ to live there. Probably cost all of $100K...but think about how much that would be worth these days...
COMMENT 388523	2013-03-22 06:15 PM
Valerie Hobbs
KDEF	2013-03-22 07:05 PM
Add Stewart Edward White and the poets: Alfred Noyes and Leonard Bacon
TWO ABBYS	2013-03-22 07:54 PM
Garrett Hardin
YIN YANG	2013-03-22 09:53 PM
Oh, Thanks 2 Abbys!! "The Tragedy of the Commons" by Garret Hardin. Does Catherine Ryan Hyde of it "Pay It Forward" fame, still live in county? Or was she in SLO? And there's our local professors, but I'm getting too nerdy.
SHAKEY	2013-03-22 11:38 PM
Roger and I
COMMENT 388584P	2013-03-23 06:18 AM
Anne Landers? Thought she was a Chicagoan?
COMMENT 388588	2013-03-23 06:30 AM
Black sparrow press was out of SB, Bukowski!
COMMENT 388592	2013-03-23 06:39 AM
This is a wonderful thread... and no, Aldous Huxley did not live here - he lived in Beachwood Canyon under the Hollywood sign - i have been to his house there many times as a friend of his wife Laura Huxley. For local thoughts, there is/was also the small publishing house Capra Press - and some of it's authors.. Thomas Sanchez, the publisher Noel Young (author of the Hot Tubs book under his nom de plume Leon Elder - his name spelled backwards)... feel free to add to the list.. Sinclair Lewis lived here - Barnaby Conrad was his secretary.. The poet Kenneth Rexroth... any of this triggering any other memories for readers?
COMMENT 388597	2013-03-23 06:58 AM
thomas sanchez..mile zero zoot suit
COMMENT 388599	2013-03-23 07:04 AM
Robert Louis Stevenson lived here for a short while, taking up residence in a cottage on Padero Lane.
ROGER DODGER	2013-03-23 07:05 AM
Bukowski? He didn't live here though he came to S.B. Alot wish I'd met him..
FLICKA	2013-03-23 07:09 AM
WOW! Must be an inspiring place to live. Glad Ernest Thayer was listed, he lived across the highway from my family in Montecito, on Hixon Rd.,(before I was born, died in 1940). His wife lived there until her death about 1955. Casey at the Bat! Ken (Ross McDonald) and Maggie Millar (pronounce Miller) were long time family friends. Interesting post here.
MR MOTO	2013-03-23 07:18 AM
Sue Grafton, Pico Iyer, Meg Gardiner
COMMENT 388615	2013-03-23 07:35 AM
Neal Graffy and Erin Graffy. Also Barney Brantingham.
COMMENT 388617	2013-03-23 07:39 AM
Sinclair Lewis, the first American to win the Nobel Prize in literature, lived in a house on Anacapa St. in the mid-1940s. There are several letters in his archives that he wrote from the home and postmarked with the address. In the letters he shares what a lovely town Santa Barbara is. He also writes of meeting a young and talented Barnaby Conrad who subsequently went back East with Lewis to be his secretary. Pretty cool!!
SBARTS	2013-03-23 08:04 AM
Tita Lanning and Neal Graffy
THINKERBILL	2013-03-23 08:34 AM
Bill Downey: "UNCLE SAM MUST BE LOSING THE WAR"
COMMENT 388649	2013-03-23 08:41 AM
Justin Lichter - "Trail Tested"
THINKERBILL	2013-03-23 08:46 AM
Aldous Huxley did live in Santa Barbara. His rented home in the San Marcos Pass area was a total loss in a forest fire. He lost a library of his most important reference books and personal papers, including all of his writings then in process. When someone asked him how he felt, Huxley replied, "I feel so clean!"
COMMENT 388653	2013-03-23 08:50 AM
"Thinker Bill" - - are you sure that huxley lived on san marcos pass? he and laura did lose TWO homes to fires in L.A.... interesting if he did...hopefully others can ring in on this. Michael Redmond should know @ SB Historical museum library...
LOURAY	2013-03-23 08:55 AM
Harvey Wheeler, famous at the time we knew him for being co-author with Eugene Burdick of the novel "Fail-Safe," was our neighbor shortly before we moved across town.
CASALUNA1	2013-03-23 08:59 AM
Karin Finell
SECCO	2013-03-23 09:02 AM
Barbara Savage, "Miles From Nowhere."
SLIPROCK9	2013-03-23 09:18 AM
Walker A. Tompkins, who wrote so many histories of this area.
COMMENT 388671	2013-03-23 09:43 AM
Gordon Forbe - Too Near the Sun.. UCSB libraray keeps a listing of all local authors/writers as well.
COMMENT 388672	2013-03-23 09:44 AM
Wallace Stegner - lived on Miramar Beach and wrote "The Women on the Wall" here in 1950
COMMENT 388679	2013-03-23 10:22 AM
How does Mark Twain sound?
COMMENT 388684	2013-03-23 10:38 AM
Monte Schulz who owns the SB Writers Festival has published 3 novels. Selden Edwards had a best-selling novel out several years ago. Film director, Jerrold Freedman has published two novels. John Steinbeck's son, a noted writer, himself, lives here(or did). Also Clare Rabe--a wonderful writer herself who presented readings at her club on lower State Street--I heard Charles Bukowski read there.... Peter Marin James Owen, who wrote 2 great books on "cowboy ethics" lived here for years before moving to--where else--Texas Neville Cramer--published a wonderful book about growing up here Brooks Firestone--tales of Santa Ynez there is a long list--congratulations to you who remembered Kenneth Rexroth and Tom Sanchez......
COMMENT 388685	2013-03-23 10:38 AM
Robert Johnson, Thirteen Moons
PAMSB	2013-03-23 11:19 AM
John Cleese, Steve Martin
LOURAY	2013-03-23 11:29 AM
While checking out parents' friend Willard (Bill) Temple, author of Give it Back to the Lemongrowers, a nifty little roman a clef about Santa B., I discovered the USCB Library list of resident authors: http://www.library.ucsb.edu/special-collections/research/sbauthors
COMMENT 388729P	2013-03-23 12:05 PM
Philip K. Dick? Not sure he lived in SB but he did write about Bishop Pike and local stuff.
COMMENT 388746P	2013-03-23 12:37 PM
Local Summerland Publishing has helped many Santa Barbara (and other national and international) authors become published, including Bud Bottoms with his wonderful children's books and recently one about how he built the dolphin fountain.
COMMENT 388775P	2013-03-23 01:45 PM
Dorothy Lyons.
COMMENT 388777P	2013-03-23 01:46 PM
Poet Barry Spacks Playwright Kimberly Snow
COMMENT 388779	2013-03-23 01:55 PM
You should include cartoonists and comic strip writers in your request. There have been quite a few who lived in Santa Barbara too.
COMMENT 388828P	2013-03-23 04:28 PM
This got me nostalgic. I don't remember them much aside from Brave New World and Doors of Perception, but I was surprised how much of Huxley's work I've read. http://www.independent.com/news/2009/mar/24/50th-anniversary-aldous-huxleys-ucsb-lecture-serie/
COMMENT 388845	2013-03-23 05:02 PM
Bob Mitchell. He is the author of six nonfiction books, a collection of poems, and the bestselling novels Match Made in Heaven and Once Upon a Fastball (which have been translated into six languages, were under three film options, have been produced as two audiobooks and two e-books, and appear in a number of college and high school curricula). His third novel Everything on the Line, about tennis and life, will be released (May, 2013) as both an e-book and an audiobook.
COMMENT 388855	2013-03-23 06:06 PM
BARNABY CONRAD..!!
LOURAY	2013-03-23 06:51 PM
388779: If we're going to include cartoonists, let's not forget Ken Ernst, who drew the Mary Worth strip for probably forty years.
COMMENT 388939	2013-03-24 07:01 AM
The fabulous Starshine Roshell
COMMENT 389379	2013-03-25 12:02 PM
Steve Martin and John Cleese
COMMENT 390375	2013-03-27 06:25 PM
@ 388461 Your comment is the opposite of the fact and I have to wonder why you would make such a comment that suggests that you know something about Peter when you clearly don't ... Peter Sklar wrote the software. He had a BA in Mathematics and an MS in Statistics. Nothng like Steve Jobs, who was not a programmer and dropped out of college.

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