Quick Facts
Biography
Marshall Sprague (March 14, 1909–September 9, 1994) was an American journalist in New York, Paris, and China and author of books about western United States History. From Ohio, he moved to Colorado Springs, Colorado to recuperate following a diagnosis of tuberculosis and settled there. He received the Colorado Authors League Top Hand Award for Massacre: The Tragedy At White River and A Gallery of Dudes, the latter of which was also nominated for a Pulitzer Prize.
Early life and career
Born March 14, 1909 in Newark, Ohio, he graduated from Lawrenceville School and Princeton University (1930), both in New Jersey. After Princeton, he first worked at Women’s Wear Daily. He was a journalist in Paris for the New York Herald-Tribune's Paris edition and China for North China Star . He then contributed to The New York Times, writing book reviews and articles for the Sunday Times.
He moved to North End of Colorado Springs, Colorado following a diagnosis of tuberculosis in 1941. As he recovered, he wrote The Business of Getting Well.
He is the author of Money Mountain (1953) about Cripple Creek and Victor gold mining. In 1957, he received the Colorado Authors League Top Hand Award for Massacre: The Tragedy At White River of the Meeker Massacre of 1879. He wrote Newport In The Rockies: The Life And Good Times Of Colorado Springs (1961), which Cleveland Amory, a social historian, described as "candid, graceful, diligently researched". He also wrote A Gallery of Dudes (1967) described as a book of "wonderful tales about eminent commoners and titled Europeans awash in the exhilarating landscapes of America's last frontier" by a critic. It received the Top Hand Award in 1967 and was nominated in 1966 for a Pulitzer Prize in history. In 1976, his book Colorado, A Bicentennial History was published. Another of his books of western history was So Vast So Beautiful a Land: Louisiana and the Purchase about the Louisiana Purchase. His memoir, Sometimes I'm Happy, was published the year following his death, with the assistance of family and friends.
Personal life
Married February 1939, his wife was Edna Jane (E.J.) (née Ailes) Sprague, an activist, serving civic commissions and boards and the Colorado Springs City Planning Commission. They had three children, Sharon, Stephen, and Joseph. He was a jazz piano player and bird watcher.
Sprague died in Colorado Springs at St. Francis Hospital at the age of 85 in September 9, 1994.
Legacy
In 2014, Alex Johnson of The Gazette said of Sprague's influence:
Marshall Sprague Park in Colorado Springs is named for him. Located at 3492 W. Woodmen in the Peregrine neighborhood, it was dedicated on August 7, 1999.