According to the press materials for Dead Street (his final crime novel), Spillane had worked on the book for more than 5 years before its publication. However, according to Spillane's friend and writing partner Max Allan Collins, Spillane may have worked on Dead Street on and off for as long as 20 years. Spillane also had hoped that Dead Street would be adapted as a film, and felt the main character (Jack Stang, a retired cop) would make a good role for an aging actor. Spillane had hoped that Stang would be played by Charles Bronson, and that his love interest would be played by Lee Meredith (which is a good indicator of how long Spillane had worked on the book).
Also worked as a circus performer, allowing himself to be shot out of a cannon in the 1950s.
Became a Jehovah's Witness in 1951.
Biography/bibliography in: "Contemporary Authors". New Revision Series, Vol. 125, pp. 361-366. Farmington Hills, MI: Gale, 2004.
Father of Robert Spillane.
Grew up in Elizabeth, New Jersey and attended Fort Hays College in Kansas, where he was a standout swimmer before beginning his career writing for magazines.
He referred to his books as "the chewing gum of American literature". He said he wrote when he needed money.
Named the main character in his last crime novel, Dead Street (2007), after his close friend Jack Stang. The two were friends since the 1940s, and appeared in the movie 'Ring of Fear (1954)' together. Spillane had even hoped that Stang would play Mike Hammer in a film, and financed a screen test for Stang in the 1950s.
Reportedly, Spillane needed quick cash to buy some land for a house in 1946, so he wrote detective novel "I, The Jury" in less than a month. Although he was a professional writer for magazines, "I, The Jury" was his first novel. It sold over three million copies and made Spillane a celebrity due to his frank combination of sex and violence. He went on to write several more novels with his main character from "I, The Jury", hard living detective Mike Hammer. Several actors have played Hammer over the years in the movies and on television. Spillane even portrayed Hammer himself in The Girl Hunters (1963) and parodied his own image in some funny Miller Lite beer commercials in the 1970s.
Stopped publishing Mike Hammer novels twice in his writing career. The first break with Hammer began in 1952, following the publication of "Kiss Me, Deadly" (and coincides with Spillane's conversion to Jehovah's Witness), and ended with the publication of "The Girl Hunters" in 1962. Spillane again stopped publishing Mike Hammer novels in 1970 after the publication of "Survival...Zero!" He did not release another Mike Hammer novel until 1989's "The Killing Man.".
The house where he lived for 35 years was destroyed by the winds of Hurricane Hugo (1989).