9. King and his wife contributed $1.2 million to a local baseball stadium, but with one condition attached.
In the early 1990s, the Kings gave over a million dollars to help build the Mansfeld Stadium in Bangor, Maine, but there was one string attached: the stadium’s scoreboard needed to be tall enough and angled in a way so that the Kings could see it from their house. Apparently, Stephen likes to follow scores from his office window when he can’t make it to the game itself.
The King home in Bangor, Maine. Source: Flickr.com
10. King almost died in 1999.
A reckless driver in a minivan crashed into King on a Maine two-lane highway and nearly killed him. King slowly recovered, but at one point, doctors thought he might not walk again. Though while he was on pain-killers King said he would retire from writing, he wrote throughout his recovery and produced one of his best books of his entire career: On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft.
11. King has a rock band.
Stephen rocks out alongside writers such as Amy Tan, Mitch Albom, Dave Barry, and Simpsons creator Matt Groening in a band called the “Rock Bottom Remainders.” They play shows together maybe once a year, at best. According to Dave Barry, “We play music as well as Metallica writes novels.”
Source: Flickr.com
12. The thing that scares him most is Alzheimer’s.
For the master of horror, the scariest thing in the world these days are the mental illnesses associated with old age, such as dementia and Alzheimer’s disease. He told NPR once, “That’s the boogeyman in the closet now. I’m afraid of losing my mind.”
14. He’s also freaked out by the number 13.
In an interview with Playboy early in his career, King said, “I have a thing about the number 13 in general; it never fails to trace that old icy finger up and down my spine. When I’m writing, I’ll never stop work if the page number is 13 or a multiple of 13; I’ll just keep on typing till I get to a safe number.” In the same interview, when asked if he was afraid of the dark, he answered, “Of course. Isn’t everybody?”
Find more fascinating info on Stephen King from the man himself in the videos below:
For even more on master of horror Stephen King, step inside The Shining hotel. Then, learn about another fiction master with these Roald Dahl facts.
