Brief Bio Blurb

Jerome David Salinger was born in New York City on January 1, 1919. His father was Jewish and his mother was Scotch-Irish.

Salinger's upbringing was not unlike that of Holden Caulfield of The Catcher in the Rye. Salinger had only an elder sister. He grew up in fashionable areas of Manhattan and for a time attended public schools. Later, the young Salinger attended prep schools where he apparently found it difficult to adjust. In 1934 his father enrolled him at Valley Forge Military Academy near Wayne, Pennsylvania, where he stayed for approximately two years, graduating in June of 1936.