Sloan Wilson (1920 - 2003)

Biography

Sloan Wilson was an American writer, best known for his novel The Man In The Grey Flannel Suit.

Sloan was born in Connecticut in 1920, the son of Albert Wilson and Ruth Danenhower.^[1] He was married to Elsie Pickhardt and Betty Stephens. Sloan passed away in Virginia in 2003^[2][3] and his ashes were scattered at sea.^[4]

“The writer Sloan Wilson, whose bestselling 1955 novel, The Man In The Grey Flannel Suit, documented suburban angst and the lives of conscience-ridden corporate executives in America, has died at the age of 83. Its reissue last year, with an introduction by Jonathan Franzen, has sparked a renaissance of interest in a writer largely forgotten by contemporary readers.

Along with other influential diagnoses of the American character at mid-century, Wilson's book offered a timely journalistic portrait of the emerging culture of what William Whyte called the Organisation Man. With sales of 2m, and a 1956 movie adaptation - directed by Nunnally Johnson, featuring Gregory Peck and Jennifer Jones, and with strong supporting performances from Frederic March and Lee J Cobb - Wilson was very much the novelist with his finger on the pulse of the moment.

...Nothing in Wilson's later career came anywhere near the success of The Man In The Grey Flannel Suit, though a sequel, The Man In The Grey Flannel Suit II (1984), took Tom Rath to Washington and a job in the Kennedy administration.

But the impact of Wilson's considerable wealth and celebrity status proved destructive, and the alcoholism, infidelity and ennui that plague the nouveau riche in his other popular novel, A Summer Place (1958), had their bearing on the author's own life. Two of the hottest Hollywood teen stars, Troy Donahue and Sandra Dee, starred in Delmer Daves's adaptation of the novel, a steamy portrayal of infidelity in a small New England town.

Wilson preferred happy endings in his novels, feeling that happiness was truer to America. In his sequel to The Man In The Grey Flannel Suit, Tom and Betsey's divorce is a happy one, some thing nearly unique in American literature.

After graduating from Harvard in 1942, Wilson served in the US coast guard reserve for 3 years, attaining the rank of lieutenant. The sea was in the family blood. His grand-father had graduated from the naval academy at Annapolis, and Wilson himself had considerable experience of sailing his family's 76ft schooner. He commanded a trawler on the Greenland patrol and published a novel, Ice Brothers (1979), about his experiences at sea.

He later commanded an army supply ship sailing from Long Beach, California, to New Guinea, and was awarded a battle star for his role in an attack by Japanese aircraft. His first novel Voyage To Somewhere (1947) drew on his experiences in the Pacific, as did his later book Pacific Interlude (1982).

After the war, he published stories in the New Yorker, and worked briefly as a journalist in Providence, Rhode Island, before being hired as a writer by Time in 1948. His period as assistant director of the US national citizen commission for the public schools is ironically presented in The Man In The Grey Flannel Suit.

Until success made Wilson wealthy, he worked as a professor of English and as a freelance writer. Despite his long struggle with alcoholism, he wrote privately published biographies and yachting histories. Suffering from Alzheimer's disease in later years, he lived on a boat at Colonial Beach, Virginia.

Two of his four children became writers. His daughter Lisa published Learning Disabilities From A to Z (1997), and his son David, a professor of biology and anthropology, is the author of Darwin's Cathedral (2002), an application of evolutionary biology and social theory to religion. They survive their father, and does his second wife, Betty.

• Sloan Wilson, writer, born May 8 1920; died May 25 2003”^[5]

Sources

1. ↑ "United States Census, 1940," database with images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/3:1:3QSQ-G9MR-FSYB?cc=2000219&wc=QZXP-SCZ%3A790105401%2C799276501%2C799336401%2C799336402 : accessed 27 January 2023), Florida > Volusia > Election Precinct 7, Ormond > 64-23 Election Precinct 7 Ormond, Ormond City, City Jail > image 3 of 53; citing Sixteenth Census of the United States, 1940, NARA digital publication T627. Records of the Bureau of the Census, 1790 - 2007, RG 29. Washington, D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration, 2012.
2. ↑ "United States Social Security Death Index," database, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:JKXG-5JW : 7 January 2021), Sloan Wilson, 25 May 2003; citing U.S. Social Security Administration, Death Master File, database (Alexandria, Virginia: National Technical Information Service, ongoing).
3. ↑ "United States, GenealogyBank Obituaries, Births, and Marriages 1980-2014," database with images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:QK4H-MRQC : accessed 27 January 2023), Sloan Wilson, Illinois, United States, 01 Jun 2003; from "Recent Newspaper Obituaries (1977 - Today)," database, GenealogyBank.com (http://www.genealogybank.com : 2014); citing Chicago Tribune, born-digital text.
4. ↑ Find a Grave, database and images (accessed 26 January 2023), memorial page for Sloan Wilson (8 May 1920–25 May 2003), no grave photo, Find A Grave: Memorial #12936974; Cremated, Ashes scattered at sea, scattered from CGC Tampa; Maintained by Find a Grave.
5. ↑ The Guardian, obituary of Sloan Wilson, written by Eric Homberger, Friday 30 May 2003, accessed online 28 Jan 2023, [1]

• "New York, New York Passenger and Crew Lists, 1909, 1925-1957," database with images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:24JF-BNW : 2 March 2021), Sloan Wilson, 1932; citing Immigration, New York, New York, United States, NARA microfilm publication T715 (Washington, D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration, n.d.).

• United States of America, Bureau of the Census; Washington, D.C.; Seventeenth Census of the United States, 1950; Record Group: Records of the Bureau of the Census, 1790-2007; Record Group Number: 29; Residence Date: 1950; Home in 1950: New Canaan, Fairfield, Connecticut; Roll: 2227; Sheet Number: 21; Enumeration District: 1-149, Sloan Wilson, 30, born Connecticut, married, Assistant Director, Netmend City in Commission for Public Schools, in household with Elsie, 28, Wife, Lisa, 3 Daughter, Rebecca, 2, Daughter, David, Son.

See Also:

• Wikipedia: Sloan Wilson
• Wikidata: Item Q2903650, en:Wikipedia