Kent Curtis
Encyclopedia
Marvin Kent Curtis was an American
novelist, illustrator
, and teacher. Curtis served in World War I
as an aviator with the Royal Air Force
, was shot down, reported dead, and held prisoner of war until the war's end. Based on his war experiences, he authored The Tired Captains, a novel centered on a group of World War I pilots. Curtis was of the "Lost Generation
," Americans born in the 1890s who came of age during World War I. He lived intermittently in Paris
during the 1920s. Curtis published primarily boys’ adventure stories set in the North Woods
of Minnesota
or in the islands off the Florida
coast.
, for whom Kent, Ohio
was named.
Curtis graduated in 1909 from Lake View High School (Chicago, Illinois)
, the year before the Kent Normal School, later Kent State University
, was founded on land donated by William S. Kent, the brother of Curtis’ grandfather. Following high school, Curtis completed his college preparatory work at Tome School
for Boys in Port Deposit, Maryland.
Curtis entered Amherst College
in 1910 as a member of the Class of 1914. There he contributed to the Amherst Olio and served as Editor-in-Chief of the Amherst Four Leaf Clover. He left the college without graduating.
when the US entered World War I
. In 1918, Curtis’ Sopwith Camel
was shot down behind enemy lines while over France. His family was notified that he had been killed in action. However, he had survived the crash and lived for nearly 40 years.
Kent enlisted as a private in the Aviation Section, Enlisted Reserve Corps of the Army at Fort Omaha
, Nebraska
, on June 7, 1917. After graduation from the School of Military Aeronautics at the University of Illinois on August 25, 1917, he was ordered to Oxford, England, where he completed flight training with the British Royal Flying Corp. Curtis’ unusual behavior in machine gun class was described in War Birds: Diary of an Unknown Aviator.
Commissioned 1st Lieutenant on May 30, 1918, he was assigned to the American 148th Aero Squadron and reported for duty on the British front in France July 4, 1918. Curtis’ first attack on enemy targets was a bombing run over Croisilles, France, on August 22, 1918. From his open cockpit biplane, he dropped 4 bombs and fired 200 rounds at enemy targets. During the Second Battle of Bapaume
, he undertook a similar mission over Bapaume, France, dropping 4 bombs and returning safely to base on August 23.
On Saturday, August 24, 1918, Curtis piloted his Sopwith Camel
#B7869 off the battlefield runway at 5:50 pm on his third mission in three days, another bombing run over Bapaume. He would not return. The Camel's maximum flying time was 2½ hours. Official documents report him missing and not returned at 8:20 pm.
The Adjutant General, War Department, wired the family that Curtis had been killed in action. Cleveland newspapers carried reports of his death. In fact Curtis’ plane was shot down behind enemy lines but he survived the crash and was taken prisoner by the Germans. He remained in German prison camps until liberated December 1, 1918, nearly a month after the November 11 Armistice
ending the war.
It was while teaching at the Snyder Outdoor School for Boys in 1922, Curtis won second place and $1,000 in a national writing competition for his scenario "The Quinn Millions for Millions of Quinns." He was teaching French, Spanish, and history to 40 boys in a remote preparatory school on Captiva Island
when George Briggs arrived with the news and with the prize.
Curtis went on to publish boys adventure stories. Three stories - The Blushing Camel, Drumbeaters Island, and the Cameleers – followed the adventures of young Alexander Brassgat living on an island off the Florida coast. These three stories were later published together as Cruises in the Sun. And he wrote one historical novel based on pilots in World War I
.
Curtis was related to Hart Crane
, the American poet. Though it is unclear whether Curtis and Crane ever met or corresponded, they became stepbrothers when Curtis’ father, Charles E. Curtis, married Crane’s mother.
Curtis was related to and corresponded with another American author and illustrator, Rockwell Kent
. Kent’s great-grandfather Marvin Kent was the brother of Rockwell Kent’s grandfather, George Lewis Kent.
Curtis crossed the Atlantic 25 times and the Pacific once. When in Paris during the 1920s he stayed often at 21 rue Visconti in the studio of Richard Myers (songwriter)
. He knew and corresponded with other artists of the period including Virgil Barker, F. Scott Fitzgerald
, Grace Flandrau
, Sinclair Lewis
, Archibald MacLeish
, Gerald and Sara Murphy
, and Howard Vincent O'Brien. Fitzgerald wrote that The Blushing Camel was one of the best boys' books he'd ever read and compared it to books by Hemingway and Twain.
Joseph Whitehill dedicated Able Baker and Others "for Kent Curtis, author of Cruises in the Sun and numerous other joyous mischief."
Curtis was an avid sailor. He introduced sailing to the camp and led 31 Big Canadian canoe trips through the Minnesota boundary waters
. He often wintered on Captiva Island
, Florida
– the subject of his boys adventure stories. He sailed the length of the Mississippi River
. And in 1932, he captained his sailboat Marelen II to victory in the St. Petersburg to Havana race.
.
Drumbeater’s Island (New York: Appleton, 1928)
The Tired Captains (New York: Appleton, 1928)
The Last Wanigan (New York: Coward-McCann, 1929)
The Cameleers (American Boy Magazine, 1932)
Cruises in the Sun (Chicago: Ralph Fletcher Seymour
, 1950)
Source: Library of Congress Online Catalog
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
novelist, illustrator
Illustrator
An Illustrator is a narrative artist who specializes in enhancing writing by providing a visual representation that corresponds to the content of the associated text...
, and teacher. Curtis served in World War I
World War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...
as an aviator with the Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force
The Royal Air Force is the aerial warfare service branch of the British Armed Forces. Formed on 1 April 1918, it is the oldest independent air force in the world...
, was shot down, reported dead, and held prisoner of war until the war's end. Based on his war experiences, he authored The Tired Captains, a novel centered on a group of World War I pilots. Curtis was of the "Lost Generation
Lost Generation
The "Lost Generation" is a term used to refer to the generation, actually a cohort, that came of age during World War I. The term was popularized by Ernest Hemingway who used it as one of two contrasting epigraphs for his novel, The Sun Also Rises. In that volume Hemingway credits the phrase to...
," Americans born in the 1890s who came of age during World War I. He lived intermittently in Paris
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
during the 1920s. Curtis published primarily boys’ adventure stories set in the North Woods
North Woods
The Laurentian Mixed Forest Province, also known as the North Woods, is a forested ecoregion in Canada and the United States. In Canada it is found in Ontario around the Great Lakes and the Saint Lawrence River through Quebec to Quebec City...
of Minnesota
Minnesota
Minnesota is a U.S. state located in the Midwestern United States. The twelfth largest state of the U.S., it is the twenty-first most populous, with 5.3 million residents. Minnesota was carved out of the eastern half of the Minnesota Territory and admitted to the Union as the thirty-second state...
or in the islands off the Florida
Florida
Florida is a state in the southeastern United States, located on the nation's Atlantic and Gulf coasts. It is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the north by Alabama and Georgia and to the east by the Atlantic Ocean. With a population of 18,801,310 as measured by the 2010 census, it...
coast.
Early years
Curtis was born in Wichita, Kansas to Charles E. Curtis and Grace Emily Kent. Curtis was named for his famous great-grandfather Marvin KentMarvin Kent
Marvin Kent was a railroad president and businessman from Portage County, Ohio, USA, and namesake of the city of Kent, Ohio, which was previously known as Franklin Mills.-Biography:...
, for whom Kent, Ohio
Kent, Ohio
Kent is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the largest city in Portage County. It is located along the Cuyahoga River in Northeastern Ohio on the western edge of the county. The population was 27,906 at the 2000 United States Census and 28,904 in the 2010 Census...
was named.
Curtis graduated in 1909 from Lake View High School (Chicago, Illinois)
Lake View High School (Chicago, Illinois)
Lake View High School is a public 4-year high school located in the Lake View neighborhood of Chicago,Illinois. It serves grades 9th through 12th. It is a part of the Chicago Public Schools District 299.-History:...
, the year before the Kent Normal School, later Kent State University
Kent State University
Kent State University is a public research university located in Kent, Ohio, United States. The university has eight campuses around the northeast Ohio region with the main campus in Kent being the largest...
, was founded on land donated by William S. Kent, the brother of Curtis’ grandfather. Following high school, Curtis completed his college preparatory work at Tome School
Tome School
The Tome School is a private school located in North East in Cecil County in Maryland, USA and is one of the oldest schools in the state of Maryland.-Port Deposit:...
for Boys in Port Deposit, Maryland.
Curtis entered Amherst College
Amherst College
Amherst College is a private liberal arts college located in Amherst, Massachusetts, United States. Amherst is an exclusively undergraduate four-year institution and enrolled 1,744 students in the fall of 2009...
in 1910 as a member of the Class of 1914. There he contributed to the Amherst Olio and served as Editor-in-Chief of the Amherst Four Leaf Clover. He left the college without graduating.
World War I Aviator
Curtis joined the Royal Air ForceRoyal Air Force
The Royal Air Force is the aerial warfare service branch of the British Armed Forces. Formed on 1 April 1918, it is the oldest independent air force in the world...
when the US entered World War I
World War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...
. In 1918, Curtis’ Sopwith Camel
Sopwith Camel
The Sopwith Camel was a British First World War single-seat biplane fighter introduced on the Western Front in 1917. Manufactured by Sopwith Aviation Company, it had a short-coupled fuselage, heavy, powerful rotary engine, and concentrated fire from twin synchronized machine guns. Though difficult...
was shot down behind enemy lines while over France. His family was notified that he had been killed in action. However, he had survived the crash and lived for nearly 40 years.
Kent enlisted as a private in the Aviation Section, Enlisted Reserve Corps of the Army at Fort Omaha
Fort Omaha
Fort Omaha, originally known as Sherman Barracks and then Omaha Barracks, is an Indian War-era United States Army supply installation. Located at 5730 North 30th Street, with the entrance at North 30th and Fort Streets in modern-day North Omaha, Nebraska, the facility is primarily occupied by ...
, Nebraska
Nebraska
Nebraska is a state on the Great Plains of the Midwestern United States. The state's capital is Lincoln and its largest city is Omaha, on the Missouri River....
, on June 7, 1917. After graduation from the School of Military Aeronautics at the University of Illinois on August 25, 1917, he was ordered to Oxford, England, where he completed flight training with the British Royal Flying Corp. Curtis’ unusual behavior in machine gun class was described in War Birds: Diary of an Unknown Aviator.
Commissioned 1st Lieutenant on May 30, 1918, he was assigned to the American 148th Aero Squadron and reported for duty on the British front in France July 4, 1918. Curtis’ first attack on enemy targets was a bombing run over Croisilles, France, on August 22, 1918. From his open cockpit biplane, he dropped 4 bombs and fired 200 rounds at enemy targets. During the Second Battle of Bapaume
Second Battle of Bapaume
The Second Battle of Bapaume was a battle of World War I that took place at Bapaume, Francebetween 21 August and 3 September 1918. It followed the Battle of Amiens and is also referred to as the second phase of that battle...
, he undertook a similar mission over Bapaume, France, dropping 4 bombs and returning safely to base on August 23.
On Saturday, August 24, 1918, Curtis piloted his Sopwith Camel
Sopwith Camel
The Sopwith Camel was a British First World War single-seat biplane fighter introduced on the Western Front in 1917. Manufactured by Sopwith Aviation Company, it had a short-coupled fuselage, heavy, powerful rotary engine, and concentrated fire from twin synchronized machine guns. Though difficult...
#B7869 off the battlefield runway at 5:50 pm on his third mission in three days, another bombing run over Bapaume. He would not return. The Camel's maximum flying time was 2½ hours. Official documents report him missing and not returned at 8:20 pm.
The Adjutant General, War Department, wired the family that Curtis had been killed in action. Cleveland newspapers carried reports of his death. In fact Curtis’ plane was shot down behind enemy lines but he survived the crash and was taken prisoner by the Germans. He remained in German prison camps until liberated December 1, 1918, nearly a month after the November 11 Armistice
Armistice
An armistice is a situation in a war where the warring parties agree to stop fighting. It is not necessarily the end of a war, but may be just a cessation of hostilities while an attempt is made to negotiate a lasting peace...
ending the war.
Literary Connections
In a letter to his sister on February 15, 1920, Curtis wrote "Good news! Tonight a check for $10 arrived as payment for a 750-word sketch accepted by the Home Sector Magazine. It is my first sale, and naturally I am much encouraged by the start." Indeed, Second-String Atrocities appeared March 13, 1920 in The Home Sector: A Weekly for the New Civilian.It was while teaching at the Snyder Outdoor School for Boys in 1922, Curtis won second place and $1,000 in a national writing competition for his scenario "The Quinn Millions for Millions of Quinns." He was teaching French, Spanish, and history to 40 boys in a remote preparatory school on Captiva Island
Captiva Island
Captiva Island is an island in Lee County in southwest Florida, located just offshore in the Gulf of Mexico.-History:According to local folklore, Captiva got its name because the pirate captain José Gaspar held his female prisoners on the island for ransom or worse...
when George Briggs arrived with the news and with the prize.
Curtis went on to publish boys adventure stories. Three stories - The Blushing Camel, Drumbeaters Island, and the Cameleers – followed the adventures of young Alexander Brassgat living on an island off the Florida coast. These three stories were later published together as Cruises in the Sun. And he wrote one historical novel based on pilots in World War I
World War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...
.
Curtis was related to Hart Crane
Hart Crane
-Career:Throughout the early 1920s, small but well-respected literary magazines published some of Crane’s lyrics, gaining him, among the avant-garde, a respect that White Buildings , his first volume, ratified and strengthened...
, the American poet. Though it is unclear whether Curtis and Crane ever met or corresponded, they became stepbrothers when Curtis’ father, Charles E. Curtis, married Crane’s mother.
Curtis was related to and corresponded with another American author and illustrator, Rockwell Kent
Rockwell Kent
Rockwell Kent was an American painter, printmaker, illustrator, and writer.- Biography :Rockwell Kent was born in Tarrytown, New York, the same year as fellow American artists George Bellows and Edward Hopper...
. Kent’s great-grandfather Marvin Kent was the brother of Rockwell Kent’s grandfather, George Lewis Kent.
Curtis crossed the Atlantic 25 times and the Pacific once. When in Paris during the 1920s he stayed often at 21 rue Visconti in the studio of Richard Myers (songwriter)
Richard Myers (songwriter)
Richard Myers was a songwriter.Together with Jack Lawrence he wrote "Hold My Hand," which was nominated for the 1954 Academy Award for Best Song....
. He knew and corresponded with other artists of the period including Virgil Barker, F. Scott Fitzgerald
F. Scott Fitzgerald
Francis Scott Key Fitzgerald was an American author of novels and short stories, whose works are the paradigm writings of the Jazz Age, a term he coined himself. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest American writers of the 20th century. Fitzgerald is considered a member of the "Lost...
, Grace Flandrau
Grace Flandrau
Grace Hodgson Flandrau was an American author of novels, short stories and journalistic pieces. Although she achieved a certain degree of critical acclaim for several of her novels, short stories and some of her journalism career during the 1920s, '30s and '40s, she faded from public literary...
, Sinclair Lewis
Sinclair Lewis
Harry Sinclair Lewis was an American novelist, short-story writer, and playwright. In 1930, he became the first writer from the United States to be awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature, "for his vigorous and graphic art of description and his ability to create, with wit and humor, new types of...
, Archibald MacLeish
Archibald MacLeish
Archibald MacLeish was an American poet, writer, and the Librarian of Congress. He is associated with the Modernist school of poetry. He received three Pulitzer Prizes for his work.-Early years:...
, Gerald and Sara Murphy
Gerald and Sara Murphy
Gerald Clery Murphy and Sara Sherman Wiborg were wealthy, expatriate Americans who moved to the French Riviera in the early 20th century and who, with their generous hospitality and flair for parties, created a vibrant social circle, particularly in the 1920s, that included a great number of...
, and Howard Vincent O'Brien. Fitzgerald wrote that The Blushing Camel was one of the best boys' books he'd ever read and compared it to books by Hemingway and Twain.
Joseph Whitehill dedicated Able Baker and Others "for Kent Curtis, author of Cruises in the Sun and numerous other joyous mischief."
Outdoorsman
Curtis spent more than 30 summers in Minnesota at Camp Mishawaka. There he served as an associate director, co-owner, counselor, and entertainment director for the boys’ camp near Grand Rapids.Curtis was an avid sailor. He introduced sailing to the camp and led 31 Big Canadian canoe trips through the Minnesota boundary waters
Boundary Waters
The Boundary Waters — also called the Quetico-Superior country — is a region of wilderness straddling the Canada–United States border between Ontario and Minnesota, in the region just west of Lake Superior. This region is part of the Superior National Forest in northeastern Minnesota, and in Canada...
. He often wintered on Captiva Island
Captiva Island
Captiva Island is an island in Lee County in southwest Florida, located just offshore in the Gulf of Mexico.-History:According to local folklore, Captiva got its name because the pirate captain José Gaspar held his female prisoners on the island for ransom or worse...
, Florida
Florida
Florida is a state in the southeastern United States, located on the nation's Atlantic and Gulf coasts. It is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the north by Alabama and Georgia and to the east by the Atlantic Ocean. With a population of 18,801,310 as measured by the 2010 census, it...
– the subject of his boys adventure stories. He sailed the length of the Mississippi River
Mississippi River
The Mississippi River is the largest river system in North America. Flowing entirely in the United States, this river rises in western Minnesota and meanders slowly southwards for to the Mississippi River Delta at the Gulf of Mexico. With its many tributaries, the Mississippi's watershed drains...
. And in 1932, he captained his sailboat Marelen II to victory in the St. Petersburg to Havana race.
Death
Curtis suffered a heart attack on December 16, 1957 and died in a Fort Myers, FL hospital on December 24. Curtis was cremated and a headstone was placed in the Kent family plot in Standing Rock Cemetery in Kent, OhioKent, Ohio
Kent is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the largest city in Portage County. It is located along the Cuyahoga River in Northeastern Ohio on the western edge of the county. The population was 27,906 at the 2000 United States Census and 28,904 in the 2010 Census...
.
Works
The Blushing Camel (New York: Appleton, 1927)Drumbeater’s Island (New York: Appleton, 1928)
The Tired Captains (New York: Appleton, 1928)
The Last Wanigan (New York: Coward-McCann, 1929)
The Cameleers (American Boy Magazine, 1932)
Cruises in the Sun (Chicago: Ralph Fletcher Seymour
Ralph Fletcher Seymour
Ralph Fletcher Seymour was an American artist, author, and publisher of the late nineteenth and the twentieth centuries...
, 1950)
Source: Library of Congress Online Catalog