Richard Bak was born and raised in Detroit, Michigan. The son of an
autoworker, Bak worked on the assembly line at Chrysler and Ford before
becoming a writer. He is a graduate of Eastern Michigan University,
where he studied history and was editor of the school's literary
magazine. As a journalist and an author, his published works generally
reflect his regional Midwestern roots.
While serving in the Marine Corps, Bak appeared as a contestant on an episode of "Truth or Consequences," but in that pre-VCR era he never got the chance to watch himself bantering with host Bob Barker on national TV. On the day the show was taped in 1973 he was in transit at Camp Pendleton; by the time the episode aired he was overseas.
Actor Jeff Daniels, a Michigan native and Civil War buff who played the role of Col. Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain in "Gettysburg" and "Gods and Generals," wrote the foreword to Bak's award-winning book, "A Distant Thunder: Michigan in the Civil War".