Elliott Arnold was born September 13, 1912, in New York City to parents Jack and Gertrude Frank Arnold. He attended college at CCNY and NYU. He began his writing career while in college, as a reporter at the Brooklyn Times. He wrote his first novel Two Loves at 18 years old. In 1932 he started writing for the NY World Telegram. During his time there he wrote Personal Combat, Only the Young, Finlandia, and The Commandos. Soon after the attack on Pearl Harbor he enlisted in the army and was assigned to the Army Air Corps. He helped in the collaboration of two official air histories, Mediterranean Sweep and Big Business. After four years in the military he was awarded the Bronze Star Metal by General MacArthur and was discharged with the rank of captain.
Elliott Arnold then went on to be a prolific writer of novels, short stories, and articles. His novels include; Blood Brothers, Time of the Gringo, Flight from Ashiya, A Night of Watching, The Proving Ground, and the Camp Grant Massacre. Many of his short stories and articles have appeared in Playboy, Reader's Digest, and Colliers. A number of his works went on to become screen plays. In 1950 Broken Arrow, based on his novel Blood Brothers was released by Twentieth Century-Fox, and in 1964, A Flight from Ashiya was released by United Artists.
During his lifetime Arnold had been acknowledged for numerous awards including: the Commonwealth Club of California Silver Medals in 1948, for Blood Brother, in 1960, for Flight from Ashiya, and in 1968, for A Night of Watching, and the Screen Writers Guild prize for Broken Arrow, in 1951. Elliott Arnold died May 13, 1980, in New York City.
From the guide to the Elliot Arnold papers, 1920s-1980, (bulk, 1934-1980), (University of Arizona Libraries, Special Collections)
