Damon Runyon (October 4, 1880 – December 10, 1946) was an American newspaperman and short story writer. He was best known for his short stories celebrating the world of Broadway in New York City that grew out of the Prohibition era. Runyon's distinctive vernacular style is known as "Runyonese," a mixture of formal speech and colorful slang, almost always in present tense, and always devoid of contractions. Runyon was born Alfred Damon Runyan in Manhattan, Kansas. He began his career as a journalist in the early 1900s, working for the Pueblo Chieftain in Colorado. He moved to New York City in 1910, where he worked for the New York American and the New York Evening Mail. He also wrote for the Hearst newspapers. Runyon's most famous stories were collected in his 1931 book, Guys and Dolls. His stories were adapted for the stage and screen, most famously in the 1955 musical Guys and Dolls, which was based on two of his stories, "The Idyll of Miss Sarah Brown" and "Blood Pressure." Runyon was also a noted sports writer, covering boxing and horse racing for the New York American. He was inducted into the National Sportscasters and Sportswriters Association Hall of Fame in 1965. Runyon died in 1946 in New York City. He was posthumously inducted into the American Theater Hall of Fame in 1972.
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