Ben Hecht gave to the popular culture of American journalism a vaudeville-style, behind-the-front-page picture of the newspaper reporter, tinted with an absurd "cinematic" realism that made him the master human-interest storywriter during the Chicago Literary Renaissance. His newspaper reports of the human comedy staged in the streets, whorehouses, and police courts of Chicago spliced journalism with the literature of popular art.

Born 28 February 1894 in New York City, Ben Hecht was descended from "a long line of humiliated Jews." When he was a young boy, his parents, Joseph and Sarah Swernofsky Hecht, peasant immigrants from southern Russia, moved to Racine, Wisconsin, where Joseph Hecht, a tailor, became a designer of women's clothes and set up a small factory.

Hecht's formal education ended on graduation from Racine High School in 1910. His extracurricular activities included membership on the football, track, and cheer leading teams, performances as a circus acrobat, and collaboration...