{"id":35833,"date":"2014-09-24T00:00:21","date_gmt":"2014-09-24T07:00:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/?p=35833"},"modified":"2014-09-23T23:38:24","modified_gmt":"2014-09-24T06:38:24","slug":"day-history-september-24th-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.todayifoundout.com\/index.php\/2014\/09\/day-history-september-24th-2\/","title":{"rendered":"This Day in History: September 24th"},"content":{"rendered":"

This Day In History<\/a>: September 24, 1896<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"Fitzgerald\"<\/a>F. Scott Fitzgerald, who exemplified the highs and lows of the Jazz Age through both his writing and his personal life, was born in St. Paul Minnesota on September 24, 1896. The son of an alcoholic father and an Irish immigrant mother, Fitzgerald was always painfully aware of the divide between his family and the social elite as he was growing up.<\/p>\n

Fitzgerald began writing at a very young age, and was far more interested in pursuing that interest than in excelling academically. When he attended Princeton University, he honed his writing chops by producing scripts for the college\u2019s Triangle Club musicals, and penning frequent articles for the Nassau Literary Magazine and the Princeton Tiger. His coursework eventually suffered, and he dropped out of school in 1917 to join the army.<\/p>\n

He continued to write, and submitted his first novel at the age of 21. It was rejected, but the publishers offered words of encouragement as well. Fitzgerald rewrote \u201cThe Romantic Egoist\u201d and tried his luck again. No go. In 1918, the army inadvertently played matchmaker by stationing him in Montgomery, Alabama, where he fell in love with Zelda Sayre, an 18-year-old belle who refused to marry Fitzgerald until he could provide for her in the manner to which she was accustomed.<\/p>\n

Luckily for Fitzgerald, his novel was accepted the third time under the title \u201cThis Side of Paradise.\u201d After it was accepted to be published, F. Scott wrote the publisher stating that he would like the book to be published as quickly as possible as \u201cI have so many things dependent on its success\u2014including of course a girl.\u201d\u00a0 It worked; after he sent a message to Zelda telling her that he had a book about to be published, she immediately accepted his proposal for marriage.<\/p>\n

The Fitzgeralds enjoyed their position as sought-after celebrities, traveling the globe and frequenting the most exclusive restaurants, salons and speakeasies. Fitzgerald mined their own life for fodder for his novels; \u201cThe Beautiful and the Damned\u201d was written the year after he and Zelda married. Three years after that, when their only child was born, Fitzgerald\u2019s best-known novel was published, \u201cThe Great Gatsby,\u201d now widely accepted as one of the great American novels.<\/p>\n

The Saturday Evening Post was the vehicle for Fitzgerald\u2019s shorter works of fiction, many based on the new free-spirited, free-thinking young American woman of the 1920s so much like Zelda \u2013 “the first flapper.”<\/a><\/p>\n

However, the hard-drinking, globe-trotting lifestyle that played so well on paper began to negatively affect the couple\u2019s life. Fitzgerald succumbed to alcoholism as Zelda slid into mental illness, and no amount of moving from city to city could help them escape their encroaching demons. By 1930, the Fitzgeralds were back in America as Zelda\u2019s breakdowns, both physical and mental, kept her in and out of institutions from that point until her death in 1948.<\/p>\n

Zelda\u2019s ill health was the inspiration for Fitzgerald\u2019s novel, \u201cTender is the Night,\u201d but his wife\u2019s downslide had a debilitating affect on his writing, and he slid deeper into his own black hole. By 1936, he was drinking heavily and deeply in debt, unable to write, and estranged from his wife. The following year he pulled himself together and worked as a freelance storywriter and screenwriter in Hollywood with modest financial, if not critical, success for his efforts.<\/p>\n

Fitzgerald was working on his last novel \u201cThe Love of the Last Tycoon,\u201d when he died on December 21, 1940 of a heart attack. He was just 44 years old and died thinking he was a failure, as none of his works had received anything more than modest success during his lifetime.<\/p>\n

After his death, F. Scott Fitzgerald gained the reputation as one of America\u2019s most prestigious authors, largely in part to his novel \u201cThe Great Gatsby,\u201d which became an American classic and required reading for just about every student.<\/p>\n

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