William A. Swanberg; Won Pulitzer Prize for Luce Biography

William A. Swanberg, 84, whose biography of Henry R. Luce earned him a Pulitzer Prize. He won his Pulitzer in 1973 for “Luce and His Empire,” the biography of the co-founder of Time Inc. The award came 11 years after he failed to win a Pulitzer for “Citizen Hearst,” a biography of William Randolph Hearst. Many blamed pressure brought on the trustees of Columbia University who had rejected the recommendation of an advisory board, marking the first time in 46 years of the Pulitzer Prizes that the trustees rejected the board’s decision. Swanberg also won a National Book Award in 1977 for a biography of Norman Thomas, the American Socialist politician who was a perennial candidate for president. Swanberg wrote 10 books, starting with “Sickles the Incredible,” published in 1956, about Gen. Daniel Edgar Sickles, a Civil War commander and New York Democrat who helped to establish Central Park. His last book, published in 1980, was “Whitney Father, Whitney Heiress,” a portrait of John Hay Whitney, the New York publisher and from U.S. ambassador to Britain and his daughter, Dorothy. In Southbury, Conn., on Sept. 17.