Ripley's Believe It or Not has become a part of the American vernacular; A Curious Man, Neal Thompson's comprehensive biography of LeRoy Robert Ripley, delves into the life of the man behind the pop-culture phenomenon.
A shy, buck-toothed, stuttering child and a chronic doodler, Ripley grew up humbly in the early 1900s with dreams of becoming a big-league baseball player. Although he was clumsy and socially awkward, his athletic ability helped him excel at the sport. When an injury sidelined Ripley from playing ball professionally, he turned to his second love--drawing. A self-taught artist, he started working as a newspaper cartoonist in San Francisco, eventually migrating to the New York Globe, where he pitched his editor an idea about sports oddities. Thus the Believe It or Not series was launched, later expanded to include strange, bizarre facts and exotic curiosities that fascinated readers and ultimately propelled the column into worldwide syndication.
Ripley's cartoons and essays were an extension of his own personality, and his work made him a popular, wealthy celebrity and a pioneer in several media. He traveled the world, hobnobbing with the rich and powerful while seeking out new material about underdogs and outcasts. Despite his success and fame, Ripley was an enigmatic misfit. Thompson (Light this Candle) traces the trajectory of Ripley's ascendency and those who influenced him, fleshing out a fully realized portrait of Ripley's life and legacy with vigor and vitality. --Kathleen Gerard, blogger at Reading Between the Lines