Lurton Blassingame

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Lurton Blassingame (February 10, 1904 – April 1988) was an American literary agent based in New York City. He represented famous authors, including Robert A. Heinlein and Frank Herbert, and helped shape mid-20th-century science fiction and other writing.

Early life and education
Blassingame was born in Fort Smith, Arkansas, and later moved with his family to Auburn, Alabama. He studied at Howard College in Birmingham and then earned a master’s degree in journalism from Columbia University. His master’s thesis focused on the history of pulp fiction.

Career
Blassingame began his career as a writer in Hollywood. In his twenties, around 1929, he started his own literary agency in Manhattan, which he ran for nearly 50 years. In 1937–1938, he and writer William Allen founded the American Library Foundation in California.

A major breakthrough came in 1943 when he represented Rosemary Taylor in Chicken Every Sunday, a best-seller later made into a film. His public relations work was done under the one-man agency Houston Branch Associates, which he sold in 1979 to Eleanor Wood and became part of Spectrum Literary Agency. He retired in 1980.

Clientele and dedications
In addition to Rosemary Taylor, Blassingame represented authors such as Robert A. Heinlein, Frank Herbert, Gerald Green, William F. Nolan, and John Barth. Heinlein dedicated his 1951 novel The Puppet Masters to Blassingame. Frank Herbert’s Whipping Star (1969–70) carried a dedication to him. Heinlein’s posthumous Grumbles from the Grave includes Blassingame’s letters among his correspondence.

Personal life and death
Blassingame married Kathryn Shaw of Montgomery, Alabama, and they had a son, Lurton Wyatt Blassingame. He was described as full of life, with interests in fishing, hunting, bridge, and attending ballet and opera. After his success, he lived at a country house near Peekskill, New York. Kathryn died in 1980, the same year Blassingame retired. He moved from New York to Florida and later to Mobile, Alabama, to be near family. He died in Mobile in April 1988 at the age of 84, after battling liver cancer.