Dramatist and screenwriter Jo Swerling was born in Bardichov, Russia. As a child, he and his family barely escaped a pogrom. With his parents, four brothers, and two sisters, Swerling fled Czarist Russia and after a dangerous journey arrived in New York. The Swerlings were poor, and Jo helped support his family by selling newspapers on street corners and by running errands. As a young man he moved to Chicago and found a job with the Chicago Herald and Examiner. In a twelve-year journalism career, he worked as a reporter, rewrite man, editorial writer, columnist, and author of a comic strip titled "Gallagher and Shean," based on two vaudeville stars. Swerling is married and has two children. His son, Jo Swerling, Jr., is a television writer and producer.

While working as the Chicago correspondent for Variety, Swerling wrote a rave review of the Marx Brothers' vaudeville act. The...