Mark Gengler grew up on a small farm near Medford, Wisconsin. He joined the Army in 1963 and was stationed at Ft. Bragg, N.C. with the 82nd Airborne Division. He saw action in the Dominican Republic in 1965. Upon discharge from active duty, he traveled America, working odd jobs in California, Texas, Colorado, Kansas and Louisiana. He returned to Wisconsin and went to broadcasting school and was a disc-jockey for seven years. He married and went to work for the University of Wisconsin-Oshkosh. After retiring in 2003, he began to write. His first novel, Noah Thorne, is the story of a young boy growing up on a Wisconsin farm in the 1920s as the country was experiencing major technological and cultural changes.