attending Harvard University and the University of Iowa, he defended his master's thesis in English Literature, on the writer Wilkie Collins, at the University of Virginia. During World War II he enlisted in the Army Air Forces on April 6, 1944. He attended Officers’ Candidate School at Yale, where Glenn Miller played in the mess hall. He served with the 723rd Army Air Forces Base Unit as a Cryptographic Officer (0224). The bulk of his time was spent in the Caribbean where he wrote and performed songs when not deciphering phantom enemy submarine signals. Up to the time of his discharge on June 4, 1946, he used his name given at birth, Marion Martin Brown, II. He moved to New York City in 1947. Thereafter, he used the name Michael. In 1950 he married Joy Williams Brown, a former ballerina who trained at the School of American Ballet and joined Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo in New York at the invitation of George Balanchine. She also danced in Europe as a principal with Roland Petit's Les Ballets de Paris. Michael Brown became friends with Margot Fonteyn through his wife, Joy, and was thus introduced to the ballet world. With his wife Joy, he had three children, Michael Martin Brown, Jr. of Hoboken, New Jersey, born in 1951; Kelly Kennedy Brown of Portland, Oregon, born in 1954; and Adam Anderson Brown born in 1964. Adam died in 1994. Michael Brown died June 11, 2014 at the age of 93 New York City. On November 4, 2014, a Memorial Celebration was held at the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts and speakers included Michael Feinstein, Jefferson Mays, and Charles Strouse. Harper Lee The couple was instrumental in the career of Harper Lee, whom Michael met through his friend Truman Capote. The Browns made it possible for Lee to work on To Kill a Mockingbird by giving her the gift of a year's financial support in 1956 with the note: "You have one year off from your job to write whatever you please. Merry Christmas." Harper Lee wrote about this Christmas gift in McCalls magazine in December 1961. However, neither she nor the Browns ever disclosed their names, which led to years of speculation in literary circles until the publication of Charles J. Shields’ unauthorized biography Mockingbird: A Portrait of Harper Lee. Confirmation of the story occurred when the Browns broke