Portrait of Peter Benchley

Birthday profile

Peter Benchley

Peter Benchley, American author and screenwriter (died 2006)

Born
May 8, 1940
Died
February 11, 2006
Zodiac sign
Taurus
Birth year
1940

About Peter Benchley

Peter Bradford Benchley was an American author. He is best known for his bestselling novel Jaws and co-wrote its movie adaptation with Carl Gottlieb. Several more of his works were also adapted for both cinema and television, including The Deep, The Island, Beast, and White Shark. The experience was told in his first book, a travel memoir titled Time and a Ticket, published by Houghton Mifflin in 1964. Later in life, Benchley expressed regret for his writing about sharks, which he felt indulged already present fear and false belief about sharks, and he became an advocate for marine conservation. After his return to the United States, Benchley had six months reserve duty in the Marine Corps, and then became a reporter for The Washington Post.

Biography source: Wikipedia. The profile adds birthday-specific historical context from the Celebs Birthday Today editorial database.

The world when Peter Benchley was born

Peter Benchley was born in 1940. The year snapshot below places that birthday in its cultural and historical setting: the music and films people were following, the headlines shaping public life, and the everyday prices families encountered.

Culture in 1940

  • #1 song"In the Mood" – Glenn Miller
  • Top movieRebecca
  • Best-selling bookFor Whom the Bell Tolls – Ernest Hemingway

Headlines and milestones

  • Major sports momentFirst televised college basketball game
  • Top headlineWinston Churchill becomes British Prime Minister
  • Technology milestoneFirst McDonald's restaurant opens
  • Defining fadSwing music hits its peak
  • Notable inventionJeep (military vehicle)
  • World population2.30 billion

United States snapshot

  • U.S. leaderFranklin D. Roosevelt
  • Sports championCincinnati Reds (World Series)
  • U.S. population132.2M

1940 versus 2026

These figures put everyday life in Peter Benchley's birth year beside the site's latest United States snapshot.

Measure19402026
Gas$0.18$3.45/gal
Average home$5,300$435,000
Average income$3,100$67,500
Minimum wage$0.30$7.25/hr (federal)
Movie ticket$0.25$11.95
Postage stamp$0.03$0.73
Population132.2M341 million

Sources and editorial standards

This profile combines a biographical source with structured birthday and historical context. Sources recorded for this profile: Wikipedia, IMDb, Wikidata. See our editorial policy for sourcing, corrections, and review standards.

Read the source biography on Wikipedia. Wikipedia text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License.