Yes, suicide ran in the masculine side of the Hemingway family- Ernest's father, Dr. E. Hemingway, shot himself in the head with his own father's Colt Civil War pistol- upstairs in his library in Oak Park. A great homeopathic physician (read "Indian Camp"), he invested foolishly in bogus Florida real estate during the "Roaring 20's" and the Ponzi era"-and lost everything. About the same time EMH's novel "A Farewell To Arms" became a best seller- and Ernest felt compelled to support one of the many women in his life he came to hate- Grace Hall Hemingway, his mother-
His younger brother Leicester, and his son Gregory, and one of his grand-daughters (Jack's daughter) all died by their own hands, as he did in July, 1961 in Idaho-- True indeed, the Greek phrasing; "Those whom the Gods bless with great gifts, they also destroy with a great and exceeding madness: Mozart, Van Gogh, Hemingway, James Joyce, Scott Joplin, George Gershwin-and the list never ends..
