Marion: The Marion Miley Story 1914-1941

by Christopher Newman

The years of the Great Depression were a glorious time for women’s amateur golf in America, and Marion Miley was one of the most dominant players of that era. A Kentucky State Amateur Champion at the age of seventeen and a three-time member of the U.S. Curtis Cup team, she won over 80 regional and national tournaments, the exploits of her remarkable career well-documented in newspapers of the time. Marion follows her remarkable life, growing up as the daughter of a prominent club maker and teaching professional in the North East, Florida, and the Mid-West, following her amazing trajectory from before her birth in Philadelphia in 1914 to her tragic headline grabbing murder during a botched country club robbery in 1941. She was just twenty-seven and still in her ascendancy at the time, playing on a par with Patty Berg, Betty Jameson, Babe Didrikson and other legends who later founded the LPGA. At the time of her death, she was also breaking new feminist ground as a spokeswoman for Standard Oil, trading on her fame as one of the game’s most accomplished, vibrant, and appealing stars. Her legacy was all but erased from the public consciousness by World War II and the years of recovery that followed. This book paints a detailed picture of just who she was, bringing her long-neglected memory vividly back to life.

360 pages, Paperback

Published July 10, 2025

About the author

Born in San Francisco, California in 1952, Christopher Newman was educated in Bay Area Catholic schools, the University of California at Santa Cruz and Birmingham University, England. He travelled overland from Europe across the Asian subcontinent to Singapore alone in his late teens. Before he was 21 he'd worked for a year aboard a tanker plying trade between the Persian Gulf and ports around the Pacific rim. He wrote the first draft of his third published novel, Manana Man, while in residence in Cali, Colombia his senior year in college. At 27, he moved to New York City, working as a trim carpenter for five years in Manhattan before publishing his first Joe Dante novel, Midtown South, in 1985. When that title met with considerable commercial success, his publisher convinced him to turn his protagonist into a series character. Eight more Joe Dante novels followed, all making various national best seller lists. Midtown North, published in 1991, was nominated for an Edgar Allan Poe Award by the Mystery Writers of America. Chains of Command, left unfinished at the time of best-selling author William Caunitz death in 1998, was completed by Mr. Newman at the estate's request. It was named a 1999 New York Times Notable Book of the Year.

Mr. Newman left New York in 2002 and currently resides in Lexington, Kentucky.