William Waller Hawkins, a New York drama critic and later a writer of fiction, was born in New York City on June 17, 1912. The second son of William Waller Hawkins, Sr., a prominent early twentieth-century journalist and longtime Chairman of the Board of Scripps-Howard Newspapers, Hawkins attended Phillips Exeter Academy and received Bachelor of Arts and Bachelor of Law degrees from Washington and Lee University in 1933 and 1935. During the second half of the 1930s Hawkins served as New York story editor for Samuel Goldwyn and Columbia Pictures, and in 1940 he became the restaurant and nightclub columnist for the New York World-Telegram. World War II interrupted Hawkins' newspaper career however, and from 1942 to 1945 he served on active duty with the U.S. Naval Reserve. Eager to resume writing, Hawkins returned to the World-Telegram as a drama critic in 1946 and for the next ten years reviewed every Manhattan theater premiere and interviewed hundreds of theater personalities. Hawkins also wrote occasional reviews of books, movies, opera, and the like; and for two years he had a weekly theater column in the Rome (Italy) Daily American. But as time passed Hawkins lost interest in his work--he later described the interviews he did as “light and superficial” and complained of boredom--so in 1954 he took a leave of absence from the World-Telegram staff. He nonetheless continued to write for the paper, though on a reduced scale. In 1956 Hawkins resigned his position with the World-Telegram altogether and devoted his time to a literary career. Hawkins' first novel, The Big Red Pocketbook, was published in 1963 and his next work, Tell the Mischief, appeared the following year. Hawkins continued to write during the 1960s, but none of his other works have seen print. In 1970 Hawkins was living at his home in Bedford Hills, New York.
