Gwen Bristow (1903โ1980), the author of seven bestselling historical novels that bring to life momentous events in American history, such as the siege of Charleston during the American Revolution (Celia Garth) and the great California gold rush (Calico Palace), was born in South Carolina, where the Bristow family had settled in the seventeenth century. After graduating from Judson College in Alabama and attending the Columbia School of Journalism, Bristow worked as a reporter for New Orleansโย Times-Picayuneย from 1925 to 1934. Through her husband, screenwriter Bruce Manning, she developed an interest in longer forms of writingโnovels and screenplays.
After Bristow moved to Hollywood, her literary career took off with the publication ofย Deep Summer, the first novel in a trilogy of Louisiana-set historical novels, which also includesย The Handsome Roadย andย This Side of Glory. Bristow continued to write about the American South and explored the settling of the American West in her bestselling novelsย Jubilee Trail, which was made into a film in 1954, and in her only work of nonfiction,ย Golden Dreams. Her novelย Tomorrow Is Foreverย also became a film, starring Claudette Colbert, Orson Welles, and Natalie Wood, in 1946.