Ken Purdy

Kenneth William Purdy (April 28, 1913 – June 7, 1972) was an American automotive writer and editor.

He was born in Chicago, Illinois in 1913, and raised mostly in Auburn, New York, by his mother after his father, songwriter William Thomas Purdy (On, Wisconsin!) died when Ken was only six. Ken graduated in 1934 from the University of Wisconsin–Madison. Soon after he got his first newspaper job with the Athol, Massachusetts Daily News. From there he went to Oshkosh, Wisconsin, to the Chicago Radio Guide, to associate editor of Look, and to the United States Office of War Information as editor of Victory during World War II. He was an editor at Parade, Car and Driver, Argosy and True magazines between the late '40s and mid '50s.