Renowned author and historian, Ron Chernow, was born in 1949 in Brooklyn, New York. After graduating with honors from Yale College and Cambridge University with degrees in English Literature, he embarked on a successful career as a freelance journalist. Between 1973 and 1982, Chernow published over sixty articles in national publications, including numerous cover stories. His journalistic talents and experience studying financial policy led him to write his extraordinary first book, The House of Morgan: An American Banking Dynasty and the Rise of Modern Finance, which won the 1990 National Book Award for Nonfiction.
The House of Morgan traces the history of four generations of the J.P. Morgan empire and was praised by The New York Times Book Review as "a tour de force." Chernow continued to explore famous financial dynasties with his second book, The Warburgs, which won the Eccles Prize as the Best Business Book of 1993. The book tells the story of a remarkable Jewish family who were Hamburg's most influential bankers of the 18th century, and their regained prosperity in America on Wall Street. Chernow's third book, Titan: The Life of John D. Rockefeller, Sr., was a national bestseller and a National Book Critics Circle Award finalist. The book brilliantly reveals the complexities of America's first billionaire, who was known as a Robber Baron, whose Standard Oil Company monopolized an entire industry before it was broken up by the famous Supreme Court anti-trust decision in 1911.
In addition to writing biographies, Chernow is a book reviewer, essayist, and radio commentator. His book reviews and op-ed articles appear frequently in The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal. He comments regularly on business and finance for National Public Radio and for many shows on CNBC, CNN, and the Fox News Channel. Chernow is also the Secretary of PEN American Center, the country’s most prominent writers’ organization, and is currently at work on a biography of Alexander Hamilton. He lives in Brooklyn Heights, New York.