One of the 20th century’s most famous American writers was a Baruchian before he was a Pulitzer Prize winner. Upton Sinclair, author of over 90 books in a variety of genres and most famous for the muckraking 1906 bestseller The Jungle, was a Free Academy graduate of the Class of 1897 (eight years behind Bernard Baruch, who graduated in 1889). Sinclair’s writings still reverberate today, with the recent Oscar-winning film There Will Be Blood based on his 1927 novel Oil! To find out more about Sinclair and New York City’s municipal college system in the late 19th century, go to Baruch College’s digital exhibition at http://newman.baruch.cuny.edu/digital/2007/upton.
Photo courtesy of City College of New York, Archives and Special Collections Division, City College Libraries