John Steinbeck a 1955 movie directed by Elia Kazan and starring James Dean. In 1960, Steinbeck bought a pickup truck and had it modified with a custom-built camper top – which was rare at the time – and drove across the United States with his faithful 'blue' standard poodle, Charley. Steinbeck nicknamed his truck "Rocinante" after Don Quixote's "noble steed". In this sometimes comical, sometimes melancholic book, Steinbeck describes what he sees from Maine to Montana to California, and from there to Texas and Louisiana and back to his home on Long Island. The restored camper truck is on exhibit in the
John Sanford (author) John Sanford (author) John Sanford or John B. Sanford, born Julian Lawrence Shapiro (May 31, 1904 – March 5, 2003), was an American screenwriter and author who wrote 24 books. The "Cambridge Companion to Jewish American Literature" describes him as, "Perhaps the most outstanding neglected novelist." A one-time member of the Communist Party, after he and his wife Marguerite Roberts refused to testify to the House Un-American Activities Committee, they were blacklisted and unable to work in Hollywood for nearly a decade. Sanford wrote half of his books after he was 80. He published a 5-volume autobiography, for which he