Jerry Spinelli

(1941 - present )

Jerry Spinelli was born on February 1, 1941 in Norristown, Pennsylvania. He is the son of Louis Anthony and Louis Mae Spinelli. He has a brother named Bill. He attended Stewart Junior High followed by Eisenhower High School, which are both in Norristown, Pennsylvania. After high school he attended Gettysburg College where he got his Bachelor’s degree of Arts. At John Hopkins College University, Spinelli got his Masters of Creative Writing.

Jerry Spinelli wanted to be a Major League Baseball player as a kid. His dream was to be a shortstop for the New York Yankees. His dream changed when he was 16. All of his classmates were partying after a huge win against a rival high school football team. Jerry decided to go home and write a poem about the game. This poem was published in the local newspaper. From then on Spinelli wanted to be a writer.

Jerry Spinelli regrets that he didn't enjoy every moment of his childhood:  “Each of us, in our kidhood, was a Huckleberry Finn, drifting on a current that seemed tortuously slow at times, poling for the shore to check out every slightest glimmer in the trees … the taste of Brussels sprouts … your first forward roll … cruising a mall without a parent … overnight it … making your own grilled cheese sandwich … the thousand landfalls of our adolescence .… And now we know what we did not know then: What an adventure it was!”

Spinelli’s first book, Space Station Seventh Grade was published in 1982. Spinelli has two award winning books Wringer and Maniac Magee. Maniac Magee won the Newbery Award in 1991. Wringer won a Newbery Honor in 1998. Both books were really successful.

Today Spinelli is living in Phoenixville, Pennsylvania. Spinelli lives with his wife, Eileen, and two of his sons Sean and Ben. Currently, Spinelli is now sixty-two years old. Spinelli enjoys listening to country music, tennis, pet rats, and traveling.

- by Nosnop

The Books of Jerry Spinelli

• The Bathwater Gang.  Boston: Little, Brown, 1990.
• The Bathwater Gang Gets Down to Business.  Boston: Little, Brown, 1992.
• Blue Ribbon Blues: A Tooter Tale.  New York: Random House, 1998.
• Crash.  New York: Knopf, 1996.
• Do the Funky Pickle.  New York: Scholastic, 1992.
• Dump Days.  Boston: Little, Brown, 1988.
• Fourth Grade Rats. New York: Scholastic, 1991.
• Jason and Marceline.  Boston: Little, Brown, 1986.
• Knots in My Yo-Yo String: The Autobiography of a Kid.  New York: Knopf, 1998.
• The Library Card.  New York: Scholastic, 1997.
• Maniac Magee.  Boston: Little, Brown, 1990.
• Night of the Whale.  Boston: Little, Brown, 1985.
• Picklemania.  New York: Scholastic, 1993.
• School Daze: Report to the Principal's Office.  New York: Scholastic, 1991.
• Space Station Seventh Grade.  Boston:  Little, Brown, 1982.
• Stargirl.  New York: Knopf, 2000.
• There's a Girl in my Hammerlock.  New York: Simon & Schuster, 1991.
• Tooter Pepperday.  New York: Random House, 1995.
• Who Put that Hair in My Toothbrush?  Boston: Little, Brown, 1984.
• Wringer.  New York: HarperCollins, 1997.