Barbara Gelb was born Barbara Stone on February 6, 1926 in Manhattan, New York. She entered Swarthmore College at the age of 16, but dropped out and took a job as a copy girl for The New York Times's editorial board. She lost her job at The Times to a returning veteran of World War II and became a freelance reporter.
She and her husband Arthur Gelb wrote several books together including Bellevue Is My Home, O'Neill, O'Neill: Life with Monte Cristo, and By Women Possessed: A Life of Eugene O'Neill. She was the author of So Short a Time: A Biography of John Reed and Louise Bryant, On the Track of Murder, and Varnished Brass: The Decade After Serpico. She also wrote a one-woman play about Carlotta Monterey entitled My Gene. She died on February 9, 2017 at the age of 91.
030