Marcus Rediker was born in Owensboro, Kentucky, in 1951, to Buford and Faye Rediker, the first of their two sons. He comes from a working class family, with roots in the mines and factories of Kentucky, Tennessee, and Virginia; he grew up in Nashville and Richmond. Rediker attended Vanderbilt University, dropped out of school and worked in a factory for three years, and graduated with a B.A.  [more]