John Steinbeck into the California Hall of Fame, located at the California Museum for History, Women and the Arts. His son, author Thomas Steinbeck, accepted the award on his behalf. To commemorate the 112th anniversary of Mr. Steinbeck's birthday on February 27, 2014, Google displayed an interactive doodle utilizing animation which included illustrations portraying scenes and quotes from several novels by the author. Steinbeck and his friend Ed Ricketts appear as a fictionalized characters in the 2016 novel, "Monterey Bay" about the founding of the Monterey Bay Aquarium, by Lindsay Hatton (Penguin Press). Steinbeck was affiliated to the St. Paul's Episcopal Church
John Steinbeck John Steinbeck IV (1946–1991). Ricketts was Steinbeck's model for the character of "Doc" in "Cannery Row" (1945) and "Sweet Thursday" (1954), "Friend Ed" in "Burning Bright", and characters in "In Dubious Battle" (1936) and "The Grapes of Wrath" (1939). Ecological themes recur in Steinbeck's novels of the period. Steinbeck's close relations with Ricketts ended in 1941 when Steinbeck moved away from Pacific Grove and divorced his wife Carol. Ricketts' biographer Eric Enno Tamm notes that, except for "East of Eden" (1952), Steinbeck's writing declined after Ricketts' untimely death in 1948. Steinbeck's novel "The Moon Is Down" (1942), about the Socrates-inspired