Leonard Mosley | |
|---|---|
| Born | 11 February 1913 Manchester, England |
| Died | June 1992 (aged 79) |
| Occupation(s) | Journalist, biographer |
Leonard Oswald MosleyOBE OStJ (11 February 1913 – June 1992)[1] was a British journalist, historian, biographer and novelist. His works include five novels and biographies of GeneralGeorge Marshall, ReichsmarschallHermann Göring,Orde Wingate,Walt Disney,Charles Lindbergh,Du Pont family,Eleanor Dulles,Allen Welsh Dulles,John Foster Dulles andDarryl F. Zanuck. He also worked as chiefwar correspondent for London'sThe Sunday Times.
Leonard Oswald Mosley was born inManchester,England on 11 February 1913, the son of Leonard Cyril Mosley and Annie Althea Mosley née Glaiser.[2] He was not related to the British fascist leaderOswald Mosley.[3] He was educated atWilliam Hulme's Grammar School.[4] At the age of seventeen he started work as a reporter for theTelegraph, a weekly paper, since defunct, which circulated inSouth Lancashire and NorthCheshire. After a year working there he lost his job as a result of an ill-timed practical joke, and then spent six months as a freelance, living in his parental home inDidsbury.[5] During the summer of 1931 he left England and made his way toAmerica.[6]
InNew York he spent three months as an Assistant Stage Manager for aburlesque show, then for half a year worked as a journalist for theNew York Daily Mirror.[7] In May 1932 he left the East Coast and drove toCalifornia in an oldFord Model T.[8] He arrived inLos Angeles just in time for the1932 Summer Olympics, which he covered as an employee ofUnited Press. He subsequently worked as a freelance journalist inHollywood. He reported on the1933 Long Beach earthquake, returning to England shortly afterwards.[9]
He found employment as a roving reporter, a job that took him all over the world. One early assignment which brought him back to the United States and made a great impression on him was the trial ofRichard Hauptmann for theLindbergh kidnapping.[10] Many years later he would write a biography of Lindbergh.
He died in 1992, aged 79.
