Leon Srabian Herald was born Leon Der Srabian in a village in Armenia in approximately
1896. As a young child, he was educated in Cairo by a wealthy uncle. In 1912, Herald and his
immediate family emigrated to America. He worked in auto assembly plants in Detroit while
learning English. Herald's entire family in Armenia were murdered in 1915 as a result of the
Armenian Genocide. Herald enlisted in the US Army however he was discharged after 3 months
due to a medical condition. In the 1920's, Herald began attending UW-Madison, where he
notably befriended Zona Gale and Marianne Moore, editor of The Dial magazine. Several issues
of The Dial include Herald's memories as a child growing up in Armenia to his voyage to the
US. Herald also wrote a number of poems and reviews for the Wisconsin State Journal during
this time. Herald became a naturalized citizen in 1923. He dropped out of the university and
moved to New York in 1925.
Herald published his first book in 1925, titled "This Waking Hour". This was the first work
in English about the Armenian Genocide written by an Armenian. He spent a brief time in
1930-1931 living in Chicago although he moved back to New York afterwards. Herald joined the
John Reed Society and was a delegate to their 1932 convention. In 1935, he helped initiate
the Federal Writers' Project which provided WPA jobs for both himself and other authors.
Throughout the 1920s and 1930s, Herald experienced the bulk of his success. He was published
in The Nation, The New Republic, The Dial, Poetry, and Ararat. He also spent a short time as
the editor of Youth, an Armenian-American weekly.
In 1938, Herald met Betty Forster and they would marry that same year. A year later, his
son, John Whittier Herald, was born. Unfortunately, his wife would die only a few years
later in 1942. After this, Herald would have a nervous breakdown and become increasingly
disillusioned with life. Herald took an interest in cosmology, doing extensive research for
the last 20 years of his life. By the 70s, Herald was on public assistance and suffered from
a multitude of medical conditions including insomnia, arthritis, ulcers, and stomach cancer.
He died in 1976.
