Morton Freedgood
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Morton Freedgood (1913 – April 16, 2006) was an American author who wrote '' The Taking of Pelham One Two Three'' and many other detective and mystery novels under the
pen name A pen name, also called a ''nom de plume'' or a literary double, is a pseudonym (or, in some cases, a variant form of a real name) adopted by an author and printed on the title page or by-line of their works in place of their real name. A pen na ...
John Godey.


Biography

Freedgood was born in
Brooklyn Brooklyn () is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Kings County, in the U.S. state of New York. Kings County is the most populous county in the State of New York, and the second-most densely populated county in the United States, be ...
, New York City, New York in 1913 and began writing at a young age. In the 1940s, he had several articles and short stories published in ''
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'', ''
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'', ''
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'' and other magazines while working full-time in the
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in New York City. He held
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and publicity posts for
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,
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,
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and other companies for several years before focusing on his writing. Freedgood also served as an
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man in the
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during
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.John Godey
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. Retrieved March 12, 2022.
JOHN GODEY OVERVIEW
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. Retrieved March 12, 2022.
JOHN GODEY: IN MEMORIAM (1912-2006) by Steve Lewis
mysteryfile.com. Retrieved March 12, 2022.
His novel '' The Wall-to-Wall Trap'' was published under his own name in 1957. He then began using the pen name John Godey—borrowed from the name of a 19th-century women's magazine—to differentiate his crime novels from his more serious writing. As Godey, he achieved commercial success with the books ''A Thrill a Minute With Jack Albany'', ''Never Put Off Till Tomorrow What You Can Kill Today'' and ''The Three Worlds of Johnny Handsome''. He saw his Jack Albany stories turned into the 1968
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film '' Never a Dull Moment'', starring
Dick Van Dyke Richard Wayne Van Dyke (born December 13, 1925) is an American actor, entertainer and comedian. His award-winning career has spanned seven decades in film, television, and stage. Van Dyke began his career as an entertainer on radio and telev ...
. ''The Taking of Pelham One Two Three'', his novel about the hijacking of a
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train, was a best seller in 1973 and was made into the 1974 movie starring
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and Robert Shaw, a 1998
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remake of the same title, and a 2009 theatrical-feature remake, '' The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3''. His work was later referenced in the film ''
Reservoir Dogs ''Reservoir Dogs'' is a 1992 American crime film written and directed by Quentin Tarantino in his feature-length debut. It stars Harvey Keitel, Tim Roth, Chris Penn, Steve Buscemi, Lawrence Tierney, Michael Madsen, Tarantino, and Edward Bunke ...
'' and
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song "
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". He died April 16, 2006 in his home in
West New York, NJ West New York is a town in the northern part of Hudson County, New Jersey, United States, situated upon the New Jersey Palisades. As of the 2020 United States census, the town's population was 52,912. The Census Bureau's Population Estimates ...
.


Bibliography

Published under his pen name John Godey unless otherwise noted.


Notes

{{DEFAULTSORT:Freedgood, Morton 1913 births 2006 deaths American mystery writers American thriller writers People from West New York, New Jersey American male novelists 20th-century American novelists 20th-century American male writers