Terkel, Studs (1912-2008), was an American author, broadcaster, and oral historian. An oral historian gathers the spoken recollections and opinions of people concerning historical events in which they participated. Many of Terkel’s books were based upon taped interviews with ordinary people. Terkel won the 1985 Pulitzer Prize for general nonfiction for “The Good War”: An Oral History of World War Two (1984). In this book, Terkel collected stories from veterans of World War II (1939-1945).
Louis Terkel was born on May 16, 1912, in New York City. He moved with his family to Chicago in 1922. He received a law degree from the University of Chicago in 1934 but never practiced law. He joined the Federal Writers’ Project, one of many New Deal programs put forth by President Franklin D. Roosevelt to help rescue the country from the Great Depression. While with the Writers’ Project, Terkel wrote and acted in plays. About this time, he gave himself the nickname “Studs” after Studs Lonigan, a tough character in novels by the Chicago author James T. Farrell.
In 1945, Terkel began to host his own radio show, “The Wax Museum,” which allowed him to showcase jazz and other forms of American music he loved. The show hosted such musicians as Woody Guthrie, Burl Ives, and Mahalia Jackson. Terkel’s love of American music led to his first book, Giants of Jazz (1957).
In 1949, Terkel began a television variety show, “Studs’ Place.” Terkel was a supporter of liberal causes throughout his life. In the early 1950’s, the United States House Un-American Activities Committee investigated him as part of its search for Communists inside and outside the government. The television network canceled “Studs’ Place” in 1952. Television broadcasters, fearful of being suspected of Communist associations, blacklisted Terkel—that is, denied him employment. See McCarthyism ; Un-American Activities Committee .
Later in 1952, Terkel began a daily program on a Chicago radio station, WFMT, featuring music and interviews. He hosted a program on this station until 1997. Terkel’s interviewing skills on radio eventually led to his being invited to create a book of interviews of people from Chicago. Edited interviews make up this book, Division Street: America (1967). Terkel’s other books include oral histories of the Great Depression in Hard Times (1970), of American workers in Working (1974), and on death in Will the Circle Be Unbroken: Reflections on Death, Rebirth, and Hunger for Faith (2001). His memoirs include Talking to Myself (1973) and Touch and Go (2007). Terkel died in Chicago on Oct. 31, 2008.
