By Shairi Smith, Ryan Forchette , and Alec Brown

1. Kurt Vonnegut, Jr By Shairi Smith, Ryan Forchette, and Alec Brown

2. The beginning… • Kurt Vonnegut was born November 11, 1922 to Edith Lieber and Kurt Vonnegut Sr. • He was born in Indianapolis. • He had an older brother, Bernard Vonnegut and a sister.

3. Getting an education • After graduating from high school, Vonnegut attended Cornell University. • He was a member of the Delta Upsilon Fraternity. • While at Cornell he enlisted into the army. Which sent him to the university of Tennessee and Carnegie institute of technology to study mechanical engineering • After the war he went to the university of Chicago and graduated there with a degree in anthropology.

4. World War II • He was a prisoner of war. • He witnessed the Fire bombing of Dresden in February of 1945. • Vonnegut was member of a group of people who survived an attack in a underground slaughterhouse. • After returning to America, he received a purple heart for what he said was a “ludicrously negligible wound.” Later he wrote he received the award after suffering a case of “frostbite.”

5. His love life • After World War II, he married his high school sweetheart Jane Marie Cox. • They separated in 1970 but they didn’t divorce until 1979. • Mean while, he was living with his future second wife, Jill Klementz, starting in 1970. • They were married after the divorce was finalized.

6. Vonnegut’s family life • Kurt’s mother committed suicide on May 14, 1944, Mother’s day. • Vonnegut raised seven kids. • He had three (mark, Edith, and Nanette) with his first wife. • Kurt also raised three of his sister, Alice’s children (James, Steven, and Kurt Adams)he adopted after she died of cancer two days after her husband was killed Newark Bay rail crash on September 15,1958. • He and his second wife also adopted an infant together, Lily, in 1982.

7. His career • Before he started writing, Kurt was a professor at the University of Iowa teaching writer’s workshop. • In all Vonnegut wrote fourteen novels, five scripts, four short stories, and five essays. • He wrote his first short story, Report of the Barn house Effect, in 1950. • He also was a graphic designer.

8. Random Facts • Vonnegut liked to smoke unfiltered Pall Malls, he said it was a classy way to commit suicide. • He attempted suicide in 1984,he later wrote about it in several of his essays. • The movie 2081 was dedicated to Kurt Vonnegut seeing how it was a 2009 remake of his short story “Harrison Bergeron.” • On November 11, 1999, the asteroid 25399 Vonnegut was dedicated to him • The top story of his home was destroyed in a fire on January 31, 1999. Leaving him suffering from smoke inhalation.

9. The Ending • Kurt Vonnegut died in his Manhattan home on April 11, 2007. • He was 84 years old. • Vonnegut died a few weeks after falling in his home resulting in numerous brain injuries.