James A. Michener, 1907 - 1997 James Albert Michener was born on February 3, 1907 in Doylestown, Pa. He earned an A.B. from Swarthmore College, an A.M. from Colorado State College of Education, and an M.A. from Harvard University. He taught for many years and was an editor for Macmillan Publishing Company. His first book, "Tales of the South Pacific," derived from Michener's service in the Pacific in World War II, won the 1947 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction and was the basis for the Rodgers and Hammerstein Broadway musical South Pacific, which won the 1950 Pulitzer Prize for Drama. Michener completed close to 40 novels. Some other epic works include "Hawaii," "Centennial," "Space," and… "Caribbean." He also wrote a significant amount of nonfiction including his autobiography "The World Is My Home." Among his many other honors, James Michener received the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1977. He was married to Patti Koon in 1935; they divorced in 1948. He married Vange Nord in 1948 (divorced 1955) and Mari Yoriko Sabusawa in 1955 (deceased 1994). He died in 1997 in Austin, Texas.
John Sidney McCain III (born August 29, 1936) is the senior United States Senator from Arizona. He was the Republican presidential nominee in the 2008 United States presidential election. McCain retired from the Navy as a Captain in 1981. He then moved to Arizona and began a career in politics. He was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives in 1982, served two terms, and was then elected to the U.S. Senate in 1986. McCain was born in the Panama Canal Zone at Coco Solo Naval Air Station. His father, John S. McCain, Jr. was a naval officer stationed there at the time. In 1951, the family settled in Northern Virginia, and McCain attended Episcopal High School, a private preparatory… boarding school in Alexandria. McCain entered the United States Naval Academy at Annapolis in 1954. He fought in the Vietnam War and was a prisoner of war (POW) beginning on October 26, 1967. In March 1968, McCain was put into solitary confinement, where he would remain for two years. In total, McCain was a POW for five and a half years. He was released on March 14, 1973. In 2014, McCain wrote Faith of My Fathers with Mark Salter. It became a New York Times bestseller.