Rod Serling

In 1948, Serling got married to Carol Kramer; who was his fellow student at the university (she had earlier refused to date him in the beginning because of his flirtatious reputation). The couple had two daughters: Jodi and Anne.

He suffered a minor heart attack and was hospitalized in1975 but when he got another attack within two weeks, he had to undergo a surgery. He died two days later. He was 50 years old at the time.

Rod Serling was born on December 25, 1924 in New York to Esther and Samuel Serling. His father was a secretary and an amateur inventor before the birth of his children but later became a grocer and a butcher. His mother was a homemaker.

Serling family moved to Binghamton in 1926, which is where he spent his childhood. Since Serling was interested in performing from a young age, his father built him a stage in the basement where he used to act.

Serling had a reputation of being a class clown in elementary school, which is why most of his teachers did not pay much attention to him but his 7th grade teacher encouraged him to take part in school’s extracurricular activities.

Serling joined the American military during WWII, shortly after graduating from Binghamton Central High School in 1943. He wanted to take part in the combat against Nazis but instead became a paratrooper in the Pacific theatre.

He came back home from the war with war injuries and a purple heart but the emotional scarring that he received by witnessing the brutality of human nature and sudden death, remained with him for the rest of his life.

Serling enrolled in the physical education program at Antioch College, Ohio. But his interest in broadcasting changed his mind and he altered his major to Literature and graduated in 1950.

Throughout his graduation, he participated in campus radio programs. He also took a part-time job as a parachute tester for the Army Air Forces; for such a job he had to, many times, put his life at risk.

In 1946, he volunteered at WNYC as an actor and writer and later, worked at the same station as a paid intern. He was first time credited for his work as a writer for the radio program, ‘Dr. Christian’.

The greatest works of Serling’s writing career are, ‘Patterns (1954)’—a program that made him famous, ‘Requiem for a Heavyweight (1956)’—a show that again validated his caliber and ‘Night Gallery (1970)’, which earned him an award for writing.