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Stars in My Crown
218 pages
Mass Market Paperback
First published January 1, 1947
2 people are currently reading
114 people want to read
About the author
Joe David Brown
13 books13 followersJoe David Brown was a journalist and author, best known for the novel Addie Pray which was adapted into the 1973 film Paper Moon.
Brown was the son of William Samuel and Lucille Lokey Brown. He attended the University of Alabama and began his career as a police reporter for the Birmingham Post in the mid-1930s. He married the former Mildred Harbour in 1935. In 1936 he was named city editor for the Dothan Eagle. He moved on to positions with newspapers in Atlanta, Chattanooga and St Louis before joining the New York Daily News in 1939.
Brown served in the 460th Parachute Field Artillery Battalion during World War II, parachuting into Normandy during the D-Day invasion. He was commissioned a second lieutenant and awarded the Bronze Star, Purple Heart and the French Croix de Guerre with palm for his service. The war also ended his marriage to Mildred. Afterward he returned to the Daily News but also began contributing fiction and non-fiction to the Saturday Evening Post. He married the former Frances O'Reilly in 1945, having met her while on assignment in Europe.
Brown's first novel, Stars in My Crown, was based on his earlier short story "Grandpa and the Miracle Grindstone". He was commissioned to adapt the novel for the 1950 film version, starring Amanda Blake, whose family was from Birmingham.
In 1949 he joined the staff of TIME magazine as a foreign correspondent, reporting from India, France and England until he left the magazine to become a freelancer in 1957. The film version of his 1956 World War II novel Kings Go Forth opened in 1958.
Brown's comic novel Addie Pray was set in Alabama during the Great Depression. The film, directed by Peter Bogdanovich, starred Ryan O'Neal and his 10-year-old daughter Tatum as con-artist partners. Tatum won an Oscar for best supporting actress, though her part was really a starring role.
Brown died of a heart attack at his home in Mayfield, Georgia in 1976.
Brown was the son of William Samuel and Lucille Lokey Brown. He attended the University of Alabama and began his career as a police reporter for the Birmingham Post in the mid-1930s. He married the former Mildred Harbour in 1935. In 1936 he was named city editor for the Dothan Eagle. He moved on to positions with newspapers in Atlanta, Chattanooga and St Louis before joining the New York Daily News in 1939.
Brown served in the 460th Parachute Field Artillery Battalion during World War II, parachuting into Normandy during the D-Day invasion. He was commissioned a second lieutenant and awarded the Bronze Star, Purple Heart and the French Croix de Guerre with palm for his service. The war also ended his marriage to Mildred. Afterward he returned to the Daily News but also began contributing fiction and non-fiction to the Saturday Evening Post. He married the former Frances O'Reilly in 1945, having met her while on assignment in Europe.
Brown's first novel, Stars in My Crown, was based on his earlier short story "Grandpa and the Miracle Grindstone". He was commissioned to adapt the novel for the 1950 film version, starring Amanda Blake, whose family was from Birmingham.
In 1949 he joined the staff of TIME magazine as a foreign correspondent, reporting from India, France and England until he left the magazine to become a freelancer in 1957. The film version of his 1956 World War II novel Kings Go Forth opened in 1958.
Brown's comic novel Addie Pray was set in Alabama during the Great Depression. The film, directed by Peter Bogdanovich, starred Ryan O'Neal and his 10-year-old daughter Tatum as con-artist partners. Tatum won an Oscar for best supporting actress, though her part was really a starring role.
Brown died of a heart attack at his home in Mayfield, Georgia in 1976.
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Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews
May 1, 2015
I read this because I saw the 1947 movie: "Stars in my Crown", aired on Turner Classic Movies, and was delighted by its warmth and good humor. The story is written from the viewpoint of John Kenyon, a young boy raised by his grandparents, the parson and the parson's wife, in a rural town in Tennessee. The story covers how Parson Josiah Dosiah Gray coped with various troubles in the community through faith and good works, the 'stars' in the title of the old hymn.
One trouble arises when the local mica vein (used to make isenglass) runs from the property of the richest man in town onto the next plot of land belonging to Uncle 'Famous' Prill, a former slave, who one way or another had helped raise and encourage every person in the community. When the mica mine closes, Uncle Famous is harassed by 'night riders', who order him to sell his land, or face being hanged. Parson Gray and young John sit up with Famous, and when the hooded riders arrive and place a rope around Famous' neck, the parson instead of confronting them, simply asks them to let him read Uncle Famous' will before going on with their 'work'.
It turns out Uncle Famous left nearly everyone among them a bequest, and a reason he wanted each of them to have it: a shotgun to one man who had been knocked over backwards by the recoil when he'd fired it as a boy, "I reckon now he's man enough to handle it"; a fishing pole to a man he'd taught to fish as a boy, but who never did as well as Uncle Famous, "'cause, Ah tole him I had a magic pole; now maybe he can cotch some fish"; to someone else, his hunting dog, Bess, "'cause he'd never had a dawg growin' up; I wants him to let her 'run free' and not put her on no rope,"; to the son of the man who'd given him his freedom, the money in his bank account (in the movie, it was his house, "next to mah freedom, the thing Ah values the most"), "because I couldn't meet my maker without leaving somethin' to the son of the man who freed me,"; his tools to a man who'd almost chopped his toe off with an axe as a boy, "now, Ah reckon he's jest about the best lumber mill boss in the world,"; and to the mine owner, the mica vein on his property, "'cause he wants it so bad - and mah bible, it's old and beat up, but Ah hope he reads it."
After which, the entire mob had a change of heart and left Uncle Famous in peace, and when John looked over the sheets of paper Parson Gray had been reading from, he realized they were blank, "there's no will..." - "Yes there is son, the Will of God."
Another crisis is an outbreak of typhoid or 'slow fever' which John Kenyon is the first to come down with. Young Doctor Harris, who has stepped into his father's shoes, but has yet to earn the trust and confidence of the town, confronts Parson Gray with being a potential carrier when the parson visits school a week later to give the invocation on the first day of school - after coming from John's sickbed. Later nearly every child and many parents come down with typhoid, and with no other discernable source, even the parson faces a crisis of faith, and comes to believe the doctor may be right - and closes the church. John feels the stress and the tension growing as the town withdraws from the parson - and the parson withdraws from the town, and seeks comfort by visiting Uncle Famous whose conversation about fishing and possible contaminated creek water reminds him that he had taken a drink from the school well a full two weeks before the beginning of school (which was why the town hadn't considered the school well as a possible source).
Several other stories show how Parson Gray helps the community cope with tragedy and loss, as well as with joy and achievement; and how he persuades a die-hard agnostic that God's been working in his life all along. A delightful book.
The movie is reasonably faithful to the book, even giving the pastor's horse the same name as in the book. Joel McCrea stars in his personal favorite role as Pastor Gray, with Ellen Drew as his wife Harriet, and young Dean Stockwell as their nephew, with Marshall Thompson narrating the movie as the grown John Kendal looking back at the long golden summer as a boy growing up in Walesburg, Ed Begley Sr as the mine owner, Juano Hernandez as Uncle Famous, Alan Hale Sr in his final role, Amanda Blake as the school teacher (Miss Kitty on "Gunsmoke"), James Mitchell as Yound Doctor Harris, Arthur Hunnicutt as colorfully-named Chloroform Wiggins, and an uncredited performance by James Arness as Alan Hale's oldest son Rufus. After seeing "Stars in My Crown, I thought Joel McCrea's performance in the role of Parson Gray holds up as well as Gregory Peck as Atticus Finch in "To Kill a Mockingbird." A marvelous movie I had never even heard of before before.
I highly recommend both the book and the movie!
Joe David Brown wrote two other books made into Hollywood movies: "Kings Go Forth", and "Addie Pray" ("Paper Moon").
One trouble arises when the local mica vein (used to make isenglass) runs from the property of the richest man in town onto the next plot of land belonging to Uncle 'Famous' Prill, a former slave, who one way or another had helped raise and encourage every person in the community. When the mica mine closes, Uncle Famous is harassed by 'night riders', who order him to sell his land, or face being hanged. Parson Gray and young John sit up with Famous, and when the hooded riders arrive and place a rope around Famous' neck, the parson instead of confronting them, simply asks them to let him read Uncle Famous' will before going on with their 'work'.
It turns out Uncle Famous left nearly everyone among them a bequest, and a reason he wanted each of them to have it: a shotgun to one man who had been knocked over backwards by the recoil when he'd fired it as a boy, "I reckon now he's man enough to handle it"; a fishing pole to a man he'd taught to fish as a boy, but who never did as well as Uncle Famous, "'cause, Ah tole him I had a magic pole; now maybe he can cotch some fish"; to someone else, his hunting dog, Bess, "'cause he'd never had a dawg growin' up; I wants him to let her 'run free' and not put her on no rope,"; to the son of the man who'd given him his freedom, the money in his bank account (in the movie, it was his house, "next to mah freedom, the thing Ah values the most"), "because I couldn't meet my maker without leaving somethin' to the son of the man who freed me,"; his tools to a man who'd almost chopped his toe off with an axe as a boy, "now, Ah reckon he's jest about the best lumber mill boss in the world,"; and to the mine owner, the mica vein on his property, "'cause he wants it so bad - and mah bible, it's old and beat up, but Ah hope he reads it."
After which, the entire mob had a change of heart and left Uncle Famous in peace, and when John looked over the sheets of paper Parson Gray had been reading from, he realized they were blank, "there's no will..." - "Yes there is son, the Will of God."
Another crisis is an outbreak of typhoid or 'slow fever' which John Kenyon is the first to come down with. Young Doctor Harris, who has stepped into his father's shoes, but has yet to earn the trust and confidence of the town, confronts Parson Gray with being a potential carrier when the parson visits school a week later to give the invocation on the first day of school - after coming from John's sickbed. Later nearly every child and many parents come down with typhoid, and with no other discernable source, even the parson faces a crisis of faith, and comes to believe the doctor may be right - and closes the church. John feels the stress and the tension growing as the town withdraws from the parson - and the parson withdraws from the town, and seeks comfort by visiting Uncle Famous whose conversation about fishing and possible contaminated creek water reminds him that he had taken a drink from the school well a full two weeks before the beginning of school (which was why the town hadn't considered the school well as a possible source).
Several other stories show how Parson Gray helps the community cope with tragedy and loss, as well as with joy and achievement; and how he persuades a die-hard agnostic that God's been working in his life all along. A delightful book.
The movie is reasonably faithful to the book, even giving the pastor's horse the same name as in the book. Joel McCrea stars in his personal favorite role as Pastor Gray, with Ellen Drew as his wife Harriet, and young Dean Stockwell as their nephew, with Marshall Thompson narrating the movie as the grown John Kendal looking back at the long golden summer as a boy growing up in Walesburg, Ed Begley Sr as the mine owner, Juano Hernandez as Uncle Famous, Alan Hale Sr in his final role, Amanda Blake as the school teacher (Miss Kitty on "Gunsmoke"), James Mitchell as Yound Doctor Harris, Arthur Hunnicutt as colorfully-named Chloroform Wiggins, and an uncredited performance by James Arness as Alan Hale's oldest son Rufus. After seeing "Stars in My Crown, I thought Joel McCrea's performance in the role of Parson Gray holds up as well as Gregory Peck as Atticus Finch in "To Kill a Mockingbird." A marvelous movie I had never even heard of before before.
I highly recommend both the book and the movie!
Joe David Brown wrote two other books made into Hollywood movies: "Kings Go Forth", and "Addie Pray" ("Paper Moon").
September 5, 2018
No matters the troubles that the townsfolk of Walesburg face, they can always trust the kind and faithful words and thoughts of their local Parson and his curious grandson as they come together to stand against hatred and illness. Brown gives readers a charming and heartfelt story of love, family and faith as his cast of engaging characters stick through dangers thick and thin. Can Parson keep his own faith strong despite those who speak against him?
June 6, 2021
There are so many books made into movies, and I generally try to pick them up in an effort to understand more - more of what made a studio reader decide this would make a movie, more of what made the characters in a movie do what they did, more of what made the viewers of a movie like it or hate it, more of what the author put into the characters. It's rare that I read a book so clearly recognizing that it is movie material, but "Stars in My Crown" is such a book.
Joe David Brown - a newspaper editor and journalist as well as author - pulled together his personal experiences with his minister grandfather to create the stories in this book, some of which were published in The Saturday Evening Post. Like those by Earl Hamner Jr., each story is by turns thought provoking, wrenching, and heart warming.
Unlike those by Earl Hamner Jr., the stories are set in Brown's native south, immediately after the civil war, and there is the added element of racial discord, which his grandfather as a minister - even though he fought on behalf of the confederacy - confronts. And, while the stories perhaps lack the suspense of those by Harper Lee, they are well-written, smooth, appealing, and touching.
In the book, his grandfather says "I hope you never write an ugly book" - encouraging his grandson to "never forget that life can be as sweet as it is bitter." His grandson took his advice. A lovely book.
Joe David Brown - a newspaper editor and journalist as well as author - pulled together his personal experiences with his minister grandfather to create the stories in this book, some of which were published in The Saturday Evening Post. Like those by Earl Hamner Jr., each story is by turns thought provoking, wrenching, and heart warming.
Unlike those by Earl Hamner Jr., the stories are set in Brown's native south, immediately after the civil war, and there is the added element of racial discord, which his grandfather as a minister - even though he fought on behalf of the confederacy - confronts. And, while the stories perhaps lack the suspense of those by Harper Lee, they are well-written, smooth, appealing, and touching.
In the book, his grandfather says "I hope you never write an ugly book" - encouraging his grandson to "never forget that life can be as sweet as it is bitter." His grandson took his advice. A lovely book.
February 24, 2019
"Grandpa always said that a man didn't appreciate a corn until he lost his feet."
I did a lot of pondering on that quote! And this one, when young John asked Grandpa, the Parson, if people could get along without religion:
"People can get along without eyes, son, but they can't see."
I read this book because I had enjoyed the movie based on it starring Joe McCrea, which I wrote about on my blog. Now a movie and a book are two different things, so I won't go into comparing them. But I do say you should read and watch both.
The first chapters of the book must be the stories that Mr. Brown wrote for the Saturday Evening Post because they stand on their own. Later chapters flow together and are much more page-turnable so keep reading. Also, bring a box of Kleenex for the end.
The author Mr. Brown also wrote Paper Moon, which I now must definitely read.
I did a lot of pondering on that quote! And this one, when young John asked Grandpa, the Parson, if people could get along without religion:
"People can get along without eyes, son, but they can't see."
I read this book because I had enjoyed the movie based on it starring Joe McCrea, which I wrote about on my blog. Now a movie and a book are two different things, so I won't go into comparing them. But I do say you should read and watch both.
The first chapters of the book must be the stories that Mr. Brown wrote for the Saturday Evening Post because they stand on their own. Later chapters flow together and are much more page-turnable so keep reading. Also, bring a box of Kleenex for the end.
The author Mr. Brown also wrote Paper Moon, which I now must definitely read.
August 28, 2017
I have read this before and liked it so much that I was delighted to see it at a library book sale. I snapped it up. Years went by. One summer evening a year ago I began reading it aloud to my grown children who happened to be at home. We loved filling our evenings out on our deck meeting the many memorable characters in the book -- Aunt Pim, Uncle Famous, Crazy Ella, Chloroform Wiggins, Young Doc Harris, but most of all Grandpa Reverend Gray whose intelligence and tact divert many poor decisions into happy conclusions. It seems every chapter elicited tears. Summer ended before the book so a year elapsed before we concluded the book together. Now we look forward to watching the 1950 film which is based on the book.
August 13, 2019
A meandering tale of growing up in a small town, with all its quirks and quaint folks. Enjoyed it just as much as the film.
October 2, 2023
A pleasant read. The 1950 movie was a reasonably accurate adaptation, molding its handful of selections from an episodic narrative into a slightly re-ordered and compacted plot. In the book, however, the minister is an elderly man and the narrator's grandfather, which gives the character much more substance and gravitas compared to the younger man (made into the narrator's uncle) played by Joel McCrea in the movie. (Filmmakers always seem to feel the need to liven things up in a superficial sense, as seen in the adaptation of an incident where the book's Parson Gray overawes a man by the force of his voice and character, where the film's Parson Gray literally takes a whip to him.) It's a slice-of-life type story, loosely linked vignettes of the various eccentric, ordinary, difficult, or beloved characters of a small Southern town. And a rare case of a minister being portrayed positively, as a fully human but staunchly upright man, and actually given a reasonable depth of wisdom and common sense.
The one niggle for me was the repeated thread of Parson Gray choosing to humor people living with lifelong delusions because he believes allowing them to have their fantasies is the "kinder" thing to do—it feels like a contradictory belief from a man otherwise devoted to truth.
The one niggle for me was the repeated thread of Parson Gray choosing to humor people living with lifelong delusions because he believes allowing them to have their fantasies is the "kinder" thing to do—it feels like a contradictory belief from a man otherwise devoted to truth.
October 16, 2025
This book was really cute. I've always liked the movie and after reading the book, I am pleased to know the movie kept all the best parts and got rid of all the non-essential parts beautifully. Even the actors/minor tweaks they made (switching a grandfather role to that of an uncle) fit the story perfectly. That being said, this was a fun read. My kids enjoyed listening in on this one.
February 18, 2025
This is a very old fashioned novel. Maybe that’s why it is so wonderful. No summary can do it justice. One must read it all to fully feel and enjoy it.
May 31, 2010
An earlier novel by the author of one of my all time favorite novels, Paper Moon, this can be a hard one to track down. But if you happen to see a copy, it's well worth the read. Joe David Brown writes in a clear style that conveys the human depth of his stories. It was interesting being able to see the roots of Paper Moon and especially the character Addie Pray in this book. It's not quite as gripping or emotionally charged, though for certain there are powerful scenes in this novel. The heavily religious overtones of the narrative are the reason for this is a three star read for me instead of a four. It's not that I have a problem with religious overtones, it's just that they were borderline heavy handed here and I prefer my messages to be more subtle and open to interpretation. Still, a fine read.
November 30, 2012
This is a very old-fashioned book that I got from a library discard many years ago. I discovered a treasure! Hope to read it again soon.
Just finished reading the book for the 2nd time. I'm changing the rating from 5 to 3 1/2. Somehow part of the charm of the book was lost over the period of 20+ years. The story is about a boy being raised by his grandparents in Alabama during the turn of the century and is told from the boy's point of view. The grandfather, a preacher by profession, was actually the main character and was larger than life. Although the book seemed a bit too sentimental and well, preachy, at times, I liked the tidbits of wisdom spoken.
Just finished reading the book for the 2nd time. I'm changing the rating from 5 to 3 1/2. Somehow part of the charm of the book was lost over the period of 20+ years. The story is about a boy being raised by his grandparents in Alabama during the turn of the century and is told from the boy's point of view. The grandfather, a preacher by profession, was actually the main character and was larger than life. Although the book seemed a bit too sentimental and well, preachy, at times, I liked the tidbits of wisdom spoken.
February 24, 2014
Very good. Older historical novel
Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews