Thomas Heggen was an American author best known for his 1946 novel Mister Roberts and its adaptations to stage and screen.

Navy service

After graduating from the University of Minnesota with a degree in journalism, Heggen moved to New York City and became an editor for Readers' Digest. He joined the US Navy immediately after the attack on Pearl Harbor and was commissioned a lieutenant in August 1942. For the duration of the war he served on supply vessels in the North Atlantic, the Caribbean and the Pacific, the latter as assistant communications officer on the cargo ship USS Virgo.

During his 14 months aboard the Virgo, Heggen wrote a collection of vignettes about daily life on the ship, which he described as sailing "from Tedium to Apathy and back again, with an occasional side trip to Monotony". Like his fictional alter ego Doug Roberts, he felt "left out" of the war and butted heads with his commander, a coarse martinet who repeatedly denied his requests for transfer to a destroyer.

Mister Roberts

Following his discharge in December 1945, he returned to New York and reworked the material into a loosely structured novel, adding an introductory chapter. His original title, The Iron-Bound Bucket, was changed to Mister Roberts by the publisher.

Despite mixed reviews, it sold over one million copies and made Heggen the toast of the New York literary scene, followed by a lucrative offer to adapt the book for the Broadway stage. For this, he enlisted the aid of humorist Max Shulman

Max Shulman

Max Shulman was an American writer and humorist best known for his television and short story character Dobie Gillis, as well as for best-selling novels.-Early life and career:...

, Heggen's former classmate at the University of Minnesota

University of Minnesota

The University of Minnesota, Twin Cities is a public research university located in Minneapolis and St. Paul, Minnesota, United States. It is the oldest and largest part of the University of Minnesota system and has the fourth-largest main campus student body in the United States, with 52,557...

, but the collaboration did not work out. He then turned to producer-director Joshua Logan

Joshua Logan

Joshua Lockwood Logan III was an American stage and film director and writer.-Early years:Logan was born in Texarkana, Texas, the son of Susan and Joshua Lockwood Logan. When he was three years old his father committed suicide...

, who emphasized the work's farcical elements while retaining its serious undertones. With Henry Fonda

Henry Fonda

Henry Jaynes Fonda was an American film and stage actor.Fonda made his mark early as a Broadway actor. He also appeared in 1938 in plays performed in White Plains, New York, with Joan Tompkins...

 in the title role, the 1948 stage version of Mister Roberts was a smash. Heggen and Logan shared the first Tony Award

Tony Award

The Antoinette Perry Award for Excellence in Theatre, more commonly known as a Tony Award, recognizes achievement in live Broadway theatre. The awards are presented by the American Theatre Wing and The Broadway League at an annual ceremony in New York City. The awards are given for Broadway...

 presented for Best Play.

Death

Bewildered by the fame he had longed for, and under pressure to turn out another bestseller, he found himself with a crippling case of writer's block. "I don't know how I wrote Mister Roberts," he admitted to a friend. "It was spirit writing". He became an insomniac and tried to cure it with increasing amounts of alcohol and prescription drugs. On 19 May 1949, Heggen drowned in his bathtub after an overdose of sleeping pills. His death was ruled a probable suicide, though he left no note and those close to him insisted it was an accident.

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