William Manchester was an American historian, biographer, and journalist. His best-known works include The Arms of Krupp, 1587–1968, The Death of a President: November 20–November 25, 1963, and A World Lit Only by Fire: The Medieval Mind and the Renaissance. Manchester was born in 1922 in Attleboro, Massachusetts, and raised in Providence, Rhode Island. He graduated from Yale University in 1943 with a bachelor's degree in history. After serving in the United States Marine Corps during World War II, he returned to Yale, where he earned a master's degree in 1947 and a Ph.D. in history in 1953. Manchester began his career as a journalist, working for the New Haven Register and the Hartford Times. He also wrote for Life, Time, and The Saturday Evening Post. In 1951, he published his first book, The Arms of Krupp, 1587–1968, which was a bestseller. Manchester's most famous work is The Death of a President: November 20–November 25, 1963 (1967), which chronicles the assassination of John F. Kennedy. The book was adapted into a film of the same name in 1974. In 1983, Manchester suffered a stroke that left him partially paralyzed and ended his career as a writer. He died in 2004 at the age of 82.