alton Trumbo was born in Montrose, Colorado, on December 9, 1905. He moved to Grand Junction, Colorado, with his parents in 1908. His parents, Maud Tillery and Orus Trumbo, had two more children, Catherine and Elizabeth.

     Trumbo peddled vegetables from his father’s vegetable garden around town. He also had a paper route and during his high school years, he worked at The Daily Sentinel as a cub reporter. He graduated from Grand Junction High School in 1924.

     After graduating, Trumbo attended the University of Colorado in Boulder for a year. While he was there, it became clear to him that writing was his passion and he was determined to become a writer. He worked on the campus humor magazine, the yearbook and the campus newspaper in addition to the Boulder newspaper.

     Because of his family’s financial difficulties, Trumbo followed them to Los Angeles in 1925. While in California, he enrolled at the University of Southern California but was not able to complete his classes.

     In 1926, Trumbo’s father died of pernicious anemia and at the age of twenty-one Trumbo became the primary provider for the family of four.

     He worked days when he could, repossessing motorcycles and even tried bootlegging until he found it too dangerous. Trumbo took a night job at the Davis Perfection Bakery. He worked there for many years, supporting his mother and sisters. As the years wore on, he became more and more desperate to leave the bakery, fearing that he would spend the rest of his life there and never become the person he and his family believed he was destined to be. During his time there, Trumbo wrote six manuscripts on subjects that would later figure heavily in two of his first published novels.

     Trumbo sold several short stories and worked as an editor, writer and critic for the "Hollywood Spectator." Then in 1934, Trumbo landed a job at Warner Bros. as a reader. From there, he signed a seven-year contract with Warner Bros. as a junior writer.

     Trumbo met his future soul mate Cleo Fincher in 1936 and after a two-year courtship, he convinced her to marry him. Their daughter Nikola was born in 1939 and son Christopher was born in 1940.

     In 1947, as one of The Hollywood Ten, Trumbo and nine other writers were blacklisted by Hollywood for refusing to reveal their political affiliation to congress. Most of the famed 10 served jail time for Contempt of Congress.

     Trumbo wrote under pseudonyms from 1947–1960 until finally breaking the blacklist when his name was credited as screenwriter for “Spartacus” and “Exodus.” Trumbo was involved in many plays and screen writings. He also wrote numerous books including the controversial "Eclipse."

     Trumbo died in California in 1976.