1947– 
WRITER UNITED STATES
King paints a masterful, terrifying picture of every child’s (and maybe adult’s) worst fear.
—ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH
The high school sophomore handed out copies of his latest writing effort, The Village Vomit, to classmates and friends. Similar to MAD Magazine, Stephen’s pseudo-newspaper made fun of everyone at Lisbon Falls High School, from jocks to teachers, cheerleaders to nerds. Stephen thought his stories were hilarious—but would the other kids like it?
He had no need to worry. Filled with fake news items like farting cow contests and faculty characters like Miss Rat Pack and Miss Maggot (real-life teachers Miss RayPach and Miss Margitan)—the Vomit was a hit! It wasn’t long before everyone in school was reading Stephen’s zine and “busting a gut,” as he described it. Though most of the teachers could take a joke, “Miss Maggot” was not pleased. Issues of the Vomit were confiscated and destroyed. Stephen was sent to detention!
Because Durham was so small, there was no school bus to Lisbon Falls, and Stephen had to ride in a taxi to high school. But it was no ordinary taxi—it was a converted hearse!
Luckily, the principal appreciated Stephen’s writing abilities more than his sense of humor. Instead of giving him detention, he arranged for Stephen to write for a real paper, the Lisbon Enterprise, covering high school sports. Stephen, who played football, was perfect for the job. He quickly learned the ins and outs of professional writing, and he was happy to earn a penny for each word he wrote. In the future, Stephen King would earn a lot more for his writing—in fact, his stories would make him a household name and a millionaire many times over!
Born on September 21, 1947, in the coastal town of Portland, Maine, Stephen King was considered a miracle baby. Doctors told Stephen’s mother, Ruth, that she would never be able to give birth, so the baby was an unexpected arrival. When Stephen was two, his father left, and it was up to his mother to support the family single-handedly. Over the next ten years, they moved a lot—Indiana, Connecticut, Wisconsin . . . wherever Ruth could find a job. Eventually, they ended up in Durham, Maine, where Ruth cared for Stephen’s grandparents. They moved into a two-story farmhouse with no running water. This was the 1950s, but they had to carry all their drinking water in from a well. There wasn’t even a bathroom—they had to use an outhouse instead!
Believe it or not, the King of Horror is terrified of rats, insects, and funerals.
Durham was tiny, with not much going on. Bored and isolated at the farmhouse, Stephen quickly developed a love for comic books. An avid reader herself, Ruth encouraged him to read and write, giving her son a quarter for each story he created. When he was only seven, Stephen wrote his first scary story about a dinosaur taking over a small town. He was particularly drawn to horror comic books, science fiction, and fantasy novels, like The Lord of the Rings.
Stephen King is one of the world’s bestselling novelists.
Although he was not the most popular boy, by middle school Stephen was becoming famous for his stories. He wrote one about some students taking over their school and handed out chapters to his classmates as he finished them. They waited on pins and needles, wishing Stephen could write faster. You see, all the characters in the suspenseful story were based on the real kids in his school—and they couldn’t wait to find out what they would do next in Stephen’s story!
In high school, Stephen was an offensive tackle for the football team and played guitar in a rock band called the MoonSpinners. Though Stephen had other interests in high school, he was still obsessed with writing. He and his best friend, Chris Chelsey, made a book of their horror stories, including doozies by Stephen like “The Cursed Expedition” and “The Thing at the Bottom of the Well.” Using a beat-up mimeograph machine, they made copies of their collection, People, Places, and Things—Volume 1, to sell. The book’s introduction read:
We warn you . . . the next time you lie in bed and hear an unreasonable creak or thump, you can try to explain it away . . . but try Steve King’s and Chris Chelsey’s explanation: People, Places, and Things.
Before graduating, Stephen had not only completed his first novel, The Aftermath, but had also begun sending his writing to publishers. One of his short stories, “I Was a Teenage Graveyard Robber,” got published, and he also won a magazine essay contest.
Stephen then went to the University of Maine, where he was active in student politics and protested the Vietnam War. There he continued writing and even had a weekly column in the college newspaper called “King’s Garbage Truck,” named for the grab bag of topics he covered. The column gave Stephen a lot of freedom—he wrote about movies, books, politics . . . whatever struck his fancy. He also sold another story. Starling Mystery Stories paid him thirty-five dollars for “The Glass Floor.” It wasn’t much, but Stephen was psyched to be making money from his writing!
But making a living as a writer wasn’t so easy. After college, Stephen got married and had a daughter, and with a family to support, he took a job at a Laundromat. Fortunately, after a year of washing clothes, Stephen got a job he liked more: teaching high school English. He still found time to write every day, hoping his stories might sell and help pay the bills. He sent his novel The Running Man to dozens of publishers, which all rejected it (years later it was made into a movie starring Arnold Schwarzenegger and Sharon Stone). But one editor at Doubleday Publishing thought Stephen had potential and told him to keep sending stories.
Stephen almost didn’t. The next book he wrote was Carrie, the story of an unpopular girl who uses her telepathic powers to get revenge on teasing classmates. Stephen hated it so much, he threw it in the garbage! Luckily, his wife fished it out and convinced him to send it to Doubleday. They loved it. Stephen almost passed out when he got their telegram: “‘Carrie’ officially a Doubleday book, $2,500 advance against royalties, congrats, kid—the future lies ahead.” The money came just in time—Stephen was broke; he couldn’t even afford a phone.
When Stephen meets with his editors, he likes to do it over hot dogs and peanuts at Yankee Stadium.
He was elated to see his first novel published (and to get a phone!), but $2,500 was still not enough money to quit his day job. Then, in 1973 Doubleday sold the paperback rights for Carrie to another company, and Stephen got another surprise. He would get $200,000 for the sale! Carrie went on to become one of Stephen’s most popular novels, and in 1976, a movie was released, starring Sissy Spacek and John Travolta. According to Stephen, “The movie made the book, and the book made me.” Stephen could finally afford to leave his teaching job and write full-time.
Over the next decades, Steven wrote some of the bestselling and scariest stories of all time: Salem’s Lot, Cujo, IT, Pet Sematary, The Shining, and The Stand. After the popularity of Carrie, each book earned Stephen millions. Instead of the trailer they had once called home, the Kings moved into a 123-year-old mansion, complete with twenty-three rooms and a black iron fence decorated with bats and spider webs. The house is even rumored to be haunted by the ghost of an old army general!
Stephen got the idea for his book PET SEMATARY when his cat Smucky got killed by a car.
Stephen has written more than eighty books, and many of them are available in more than thirty languages. Many of his stories have been made into movies: Carrie, The Shining, Stand by Me, The Shawshank Redemption, and The Green Mile, to name a few. Just like his high school classmates, now millions of fans are spellbound by Stephen’s tales. But for Stephen King, writing has always been his life’s passion, ever since he wrote his first stories for his mom, at a quarter apiece.