Louis Adamic (1898-1951) was a Slovene-American author and translator, mostly known for writing about and advocating for ethnic diversity of America.
He was born Alojz Adamič on March 23, 1898 at Praproče Mansion in Praproce pri Grosupljem in the region of Lower Carniola (then part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire), in what is now Slovenia. The oldest son of a peasant family, he was given a limited childhood education at the city school and, in 1909, entered the primary school at Ljubljana. Early in his third year he joined a secret students' political club associated with the Yugoslav Nationalistic Movement that had recently sprung up in the South-Slavic provinces of Austria-Hungary.
Adamič emigrated to the United States at age 15, settling in a heavily ethnic Croatian fishing community of San Pedro, California, and became a naturalized U.S. citizen in 1918 as Louis Adamic. He worked as a manual laborer and later at a Yugoslavian daily newspaper, Narodni Glas ("The Voice of the Nation"), published in New York. As an American soldier he participated in combat on the Western front during WWI.
From 1940 onwards, he served as editor of the magazine Common Ground, and after the war became professional writer. He authored numerous books based on his labor experiences in America and his former life in Slovenia. He achieved national acclaim in America in 1934 with his bestseller The Native's Return and won the Anisfield-Wolf Book Award for From Many Lands in 1941.
During WWII he supported the Yugoslav National liberation struggle and the establishment of a socialist Yugoslav federation. He founded the United Committee of South-Slavic Americans in support of Marshal Tito. From 1949 he was a corresponding member of the Slovenian Academy of Sciences and Arts.
Owing to ill health, he is believed to have shot himself at his residence in Milford, New Jersey on September 4, 1951, aged 53.

He was born Alojz Adamič on March 23, 1898 at Praproče Mansion in Praproce pri Grosupljem in the region of Lower Carniola (then part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire), in what is now Slovenia. The oldest son of a peasant family, he was given a limited childhood education at the city school and, in 1909, entered the primary school at Ljubljana. Early in his third year he joined a secret students’ political club associated with the Yugoslav Nationalistic Movement that had recently sprung up in the South-Slavic provinces of Austria-Hungary.
Adamič emigrated to the United States at age 15, settling in a heavily ethnic Croatian fishing community of San Pedro, California, and became a naturalized U.S. citizen in 1918 as Louis Adamic. He worked as a manual laborer and later at a Yugoslavian daily newspaper, Narodni Glas (“The Voice of the Nation”), published in New York. As an American soldier he participated in combat on the Western front during WWI.
From 1940 onwards, he served as editor of the magazine Common Ground, and after the war became professional writer. He authored numerous books based on his labor experiences in America and his former life in Slovenia. He achieved national acclaim in America in 1934 with his bestseller The Native’s Return and won the Anisfield-Wolf Book Award for From Many Lands in 1941.
During WWII he supported the Yugoslav National liberation struggle and the establishment of a socialist Yugoslav federation. He founded the United Committee of South-Slavic Americans in support of Marshal Tito. From 1949 he was a corresponding member of the Slovenian Academy of Sciences and Arts.
Owing to ill health, he is believed to have shot himself at his residence in Milford, New Jersey on September 4, 1951, aged 53.