Michael J. Schumacher, a Wisconsin author whose books included biographies of Allen Ginsberg and Eric Clapton, has died, his family said.
Schumacher’s daughter, Emily Joy Schumacher, confirmed Monday that her father passed away on Dec. 29. She did not provide the cause of death. Schumacher was 75.
Schumacher produced a wide range of works, from biographies of cultural figures to accounts of Great Lakes history and shipwrecks. His daughter said he worked in a way that focused on writing and research over long periods, building a career that followed two parallel paths: one centered on biographies and another on Great Lakes lore.
Among the biographies Schumacher wrote were “Francis Ford Coppola: A Filmmaker’s Life,” “Crossroads: The Life and Music of Eric Clapton,” and “Dharma Lion: A Biography of Allen Ginsberg.” He also wrote “Mr. Basketball: George Mikan, the Minneapolis Lakers & the Birth of the NBA,” and “Will Eisner: A Dreamer’s Life in Comics.”
Schumacher was born in Kansas but lived most of his life in Kenosha, Wisconsin. His daughter said he studied political science at the University of Wisconsin-Parkside but left the school just one credit short of graduating.
Living on the Lake Michigan shore in Kenosha, Schumacher wrote about major Great Lakes disasters. His works included accounts of the sinking of the Edmund Fitzgerald during a storm on Lake Superior in 1975, and a November 1913 storm that claimed the lives of more than 250 Great Lakes sailors. He also wrote about an event in 1958 in which four sailors fought to survive on Lake Michigan after their ship sank in a storm.
Emily Joy Schumacher described her father as “a history person” and “a good human.” She said he worked longhand, filling countless flip notebooks, and later transcribed them on a typewriter, and that she still remembers the sound of the keys clacking.
“My dad was a very generous person with people,” Emily Joy Schumacher said. She added that he “loved people” and “loved stories,” and said her memories of him include him “engaged in conversation, coffee in his hand and his notebook.”