One of Canada's most prolific and varied playwrights, Len Peterson has written more than one thousand radio plays (original and adaptations), forty television scripts, several film scripts, musicals, and stage plays (many of them unpublished), for both adults and children. He is also one of Canada's first playwrights to make a living writing full-time, beginning his career in radio in 1939. Peterson is best known for his socially critical plays: for radio, They're All Afraid (1944), Burlap Bags (1946), and Joe Katona (1961); for television, Ice on Fire (1957); for the stage, The Great Hunger (1960).

Leonard Byron Peterson was born in Regina on 15 March 1917, the only son of Nels and Marion Peterson. He was educated at Regina's Kitchener Public School and Scott Collegiate, from which he graduated in 1935. In high school Peterson excelled at many sports, including football and wrestling. He went on to a general arts degree at Luther College (1935-1936) in...