James Thurber was an American author and cartoonist best known for his illustrations and short stories published in The New Yorker magazine. Thurber attended Ohio State University, but never graduated as a result of his poor eyesight. In 1925, Thurber relocated to New York and became a reporter for the New York Evening Post. He joined the staff of The New Yorker in 1927 and began drawing cartoons in 1930. Thurber left The New Yorker in 1933 but continued to contribute regularly until 1950. Many of Thurber s famous short stories?such as The Dog that Bit People, The Night the Bird Fell, and The Secret Life of Walter Mitty have been compiled into anthologies, and his classic tale about the daydreaming everyman served as the inspiration for the 2013 film The Secret Life of Walter Mitty starring Ben Stiller and Kristen Wiig. Thurber passed away in 1961.