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AMERICANS IN
LONDON
Famous Americans Have Left Their Mark
| CARL H. LARSEN |
ust for a minute, I felt the few minutes later while looking out
excitement of American a window from the spacious suite, I
writer John Steinbeck as immediately sensed the emotion of
he settled in at 116 Picca- what Steinbeck wrote when he took up
dilly in 1943 to become a residence here. He told his wife, Gwyn,
war correspondent for The that from his quarters, “all of London I
JNew York Herald Tribune. have ever read about is there.”
Today the address belongs to the five- And so it still is. The prospect looks
star Athenaeum Hotel, a modern and out on St. James’s Park just across the
convenient lodging a few minutes from street and, to the left in the distance,
Piccadilly Circus where my wife and I is St. Paul’s Cathedral, the government
stayed on a recent trip. complex of Whitehall, while “a little
farther to the right is Big Ben, so close
One afternoon, I timidly asked the I could set my watch by it,” Steinbeck
hotel concierge: “May I peek into the wrote. And even closer were St. James’s
penthouse, if it is not occupied?” Palace and Buckingham Palace through
the trees.
“Certainly,” came the reply. And a
86 Wine Dine & Travel Summer 2014

