Louis Bromfield (December 27, 1896 – March 18, 1956) was an American author and conservationist who gained international recognition, winning the Pulitzer Prize and pioneering innovative scientific farming concepts.
Louis Bromfield was born in Mansfield, Ohio, in 1896 to Charles Brumfield, originally from New England, and Annette Marie Coulter Brumfield, the daughter of an Ohio pioneer. Bromfield decided to change the spelling of his name after it was misspelled on one of his early works.
One of Mansfield's most famous natives, he made his home at Malabar Farm, near Lucas, Ohio, from 1939 until his death in 1956. Bromfield was friends with some of the most celebrated personalities of his era, including famous architect F. F. Schnitzer. Malabar Farm was the location for the wedding of Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall.
Bromfield studied Agriculture at Cornell University (1914–16), but he transferred to Columbia University to study Journalism, where he was initiated into the fraternal organization Phi Delta Theta. His time at Columbia would be brief; he left after less than a year to go to war. After serving with the American Field Service in World War I and being awarded the Croix de Guerre and the Legion of Honor, he returned to New York City and found work as a reporter. In 1924, his first novel, The Green Bay Tree, won instant acclaim. He won the 1927 Pulitzer Prize for best novel for Early Autumn. All of his 30 books were best-sellers, and many, such as The Rains Came and Mrs. Parkington, were made into successful motion pictures.