Biography

Internationally acclaimed author John Jakes was born and raised in Chicago. He graduated from DePauw University with a degree in creative writing and later also added an M.A. in literature from Ohio State to his résumé. Jakes worked as a copywriter for advertising agencies for sixteen years before making the decision to become a full-time author of fiction. His first published work in 1950 was for pulp magazines like Amazing Stories. His made his breakthrough in 1973 when he received a $15,000 advance payment from a paperback publisher to begin work on The Kent Family Chronicles, a series of eight novels detailing the lives of a fictional American family through 200 years of history. By the time the final volume hit the shelves, more than 30 million copies had been sold. Jakes wrote all of his manuscripts on a typewriter he had purchased for $35 in 1955.

By the late 70s, Jakes had published more than 200 stories of science fiction, fantasy, crime and the Wild West, in addition to 50 novels, of which six (set during the Roman/Biblical era) appeared under the pseudonym Jay Scotland (his other frequent aliases were Robert Hart Davis and J. X. Williams). Ultimately his best known work has been the epic, bestselling North and South trilogy. This Pulitzer-prize nominated saga of two families, the Hazards (pioneering Yankee industrialists) and the Mains (traditional Southern plantation owners) and their relationship during the Civil War and its aftermath was adapted by ABC-TV as a miniseries. An all-star cast was headed by Patrick Swayze (as Orry Main) and James Read (as George Hazard). Sadly, the superior production values so evident in the filming of Book One rather diminished in the subsequent instalments. Script and most of the acting, however, were excellent throughout. Both books and series also benefitted greatly from the author's meticulous research and his adherence to the historical record and his uncanny ability to make his characters believably human, be it for good or bad. Jakes has been popularly dubbed "America's history teacher" and "the people's author".

John Jakes lived and worked for many years in Hilton Head, South Carolina, before relocating to Bird Key in Sarasota, Florida. His wife Rachel briefly appeared as Mary Todd Lincoln in North & South: Book 1, North & South (1985). They had four children. Jakes died at the age of 90 on March 11 2023.