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Hemingway Biography

Ernest Hemingway – 1899-1961
Ernest’s Childhood
Ernest Miller Hemingway was born on July 21, 1899 in the family’s home at 339 North Oak Park Avenue, Oak Park, Illinois. The family’s home was built by Ernest’s maternal grandfather Ernest Hall (www.lostgeneration.com). Ernest was the second child of a family of six children. He had four sisters and a brother. Ernest’s parents Dr. Clarence and Grace (nee Hall) Hemingway met while they were both students at Oak Park High School. His father was a general practitioner physician and his mother had trained as a singer. Ernest acquired his love of nature early in life while spending summers at the family summerhouse ‘Windemere’ on Walloon Lake in Northern Michigan (www.lostgeneration.com). He became a great lover of the outdoors, walking barefoot in the woods and participating in hunting and fishing.
Young Adult – Begins his Literary Career, Serves in World War I
After graduating from high school, his parents had wanted him to follow in his father’s footsteps and go to medical school. However, he did not attend college at all and instead began his literary career as a reporter for the Kansas City Star newspaper. He only worked at the Star for six months when he decided to enlist in the Red Cross to serve in World War I in 1918. Due to his poor eyesight, Hemingway was not able to enlist in active duty but volunteered to drive ambulances. While stationed in Italy on the “west bank of a river near Fossalta, Ernest had been severely wounded,” while carrying a supply of cigarettes, postcards and chocolates for the Italian soldiers (Baker 44). He first got hit with shrapnel quickly followed by a splatter of machine gun fire. Seeing a badly hurt man next to him, he hurled the man up over his shoulder and began to carry him back toward the command post. He had gone about fifty yards when another round of machine gun fire tore into his right leg and knee. The injury caused him to collapse but he somehow...