Jay Anson (1921 – 1980)

He was a lifelong Newspaperman before publishing the best-selling book The Amityville Horror in 1977. The book was based on a true story following the strange occurrences in a large Dutch Colonial house in Amityville, NY after a young couple and their children move in. The year previous to them moving into the house a young man murdered his parents and four siblings in the house. A film based on the book was released in 1979.

Jay Anson died March 12, 1980, following heart surgery. He was 58 years old. That fall, his second novel, 666, also about a haunted house, was released.