Bill, the Galactic Hero on the Planet of Ten Thousand Bars

Harry Harrison was born Henry Maxwell Dempsey on March 12, 1925 in Stamford, Connecticut. He was drafted into the U. S. Air Corps in 1943 and became a sharpshooter, a military policeman, a gunnery instructor, and a specialist in the prototypes of computer-guided bomb-sights and gun turrets. After being discharged, he graduated from Hunter College show more with a degree in art. By the end of the 1940s, he was running a small studio that specialized in selling illustrations to comics and science-fiction magazines. He then moved on to editing some of the magazines. As the market for comics began to shrink, he started writing for science-fiction magazines. He wrote short science fiction stories and novels including Deathworld, Captive Universe, Montezuma's Revenge, Star Smashers of the Galaxy Rangers, Stonehenge, West of Eden, Stars and Stripes Forever. He also wrote the Stainless Steel Rat series and the Bill, the Galactic Hero series. His novel Make Room! Make Room! Was the inspiration for the movie Soylent Green. He also wrote under the pseudonyms Hank Dempsey, Felix Boyd, Wade Kaempfert, Cameron Hall, Philip St. John, and Leslie Charteris. He died on August 15, 2012 at the age of 87. (Bowker Author Biography) show less