Erle Stanley Gardner (July 17, 1889 – March 11, 1970) was an American
lawyer
A lawyer is a person who practices law. The role of a lawyer varies greatly across different legal jurisdictions. A lawyer can be classified as an advocate, attorney, barrister, canon lawyer, civil law notary, counsel, counselor, solic ...
and
author
An author is the writer of a book, article, play, mostly written work. A broader definition of the word "author" states:
"''An author is "the person who originated or gave existence to anything" and whose authorship determines responsibility f ...
. He is best known for the
Perry Mason
Perry Mason is a fictional character, an American criminal defense lawyer who is the main character in works of detective fiction written by Erle Stanley Gardner. Perry Mason features in 82 novels and 4 short stories, all of which involve a cli ...
series of
detective stories
A detective is an investigator, usually a member of a law enforcement agency. They often collect information to solve crimes by talking to witnesses and informants, collecting physical evidence, or searching records in databases. This leads th ...
, but he wrote numerous other novels and shorter pieces and also a series of nonfiction books, mostly narrations of his travels through
Baja California
Baja California (; 'Lower California'), officially the Free and Sovereign State of Baja California ( es, Estado Libre y Soberano de Baja California), is a state in Mexico. It is the northernmost and westernmost of the 32 federal entities of Mex ...
and other regions in
Mexico
Mexico (Spanish: México), officially the United Mexican States, is a country in the southern portion of North America. It is bordered to the north by the United States; to the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; to the southeast by Guatema ...
.
The best-selling American author of the 20th century at the time of his death, Gardner also published under numerous pseudonyms, including A.A. Fair, Kyle Corning, Charles M. Green, Carleton Kendrake, Charles J. Kenny, Stephen Caldwell, Les Tillray and Robert Parr.
Life and work
![First National Bank Building Ventura (cropped)](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/24/First_National_Bank_Building_Ventura_%28cropped%29.jpg)
Gardner was born in
Malden, Massachusetts
Malden is a city in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States. At the time of the 2020 U.S. Census, the population was 66,263 people.
History
Malden, a hilly woodland area north of the Mystic River, was settled by Puritans in 1640 on la ...
, the son of Grace Adelma (Waugh) and Charles Walter Gardner. Gardner graduated from
Palo Alto High School
Palo Alto Senior High School, commonly referred to locally as "Paly", is a comprehensive public high school in Palo Alto, California. Operated by the Palo Alto Unified School District, the school is one of two schools in the district, the other b ...
in
California
California is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States, located along the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the List of states and territori ...
in 1909 and enrolled at
Valparaiso University School of Law
The Valparaiso University Law School was the law school of Valparaiso University, a private university in Valparaiso, Indiana. Founded in 1879, the school was accredited by the American Bar Association in 1929 and admitted to the Association of Am ...
in
Indiana
Indiana () is a U.S. state in the Midwestern United States. It is the 38th-largest by area and the 17th-most populous of the 50 States. Its capital and largest city is Indianapolis. Indiana was admitted to the United States as the 19th s ...
. He was suspended after approximately one month when his interest in boxing became a distraction. He returned to California, pursued his legal education on his own, and passed the California State Bar examination in 1911.
[
Gardner started his legal career by working as a typist at a law firm in California for three years. Once he was admitted to the Bar, he started working as a trial lawyer by defending impoverished people, in particular Chinese and Mexican immigrants. This experience led to his founding the Court of Last Resort in the 1940s. The Court of Last Resort, dedicated to helping people who were imprisoned unfairly or couldn't get a fair trial, was the first of several organizations that advocate for the wrongly convicted, which among others include ]The Innocence Project
''The Innocence Project'' is a television drama series created by BBC Northern Ireland and first broadcast on BBC One on 9 November 2006.
The series follows the work of Professor Jon Ford (Lloyd Owen), who sets up ''The Innocence Project'', pe ...
, Center on Wrongful Convictions at Northwestern Pritzker School of Law, and Centurion
A centurion (; la, centurio , . la, centuriones, label=none; grc-gre, κεντυρίων, kentyríōn, or ) was a position in the Roman army during classical antiquity, nominally the commander of a century (), a military unit of around 80 ...
.
In 1912, Gardner wed Natalie Frances Talbert. They had a daughter, Grace.[ He opened his first law office in ]Merced
Merced (; Spanish for "Mercy") is a city in, and the county seat of, Merced County, California, United States, in the San Joaquin Valley. As of the 2020 Census, the city had a population of 86,333, up from 78,958 in 2010. Incorporated on April 1 ...
in 1917, but closed it after accepting a position at a sales agency. In 1921, he returned to law as a member of the Ventura firm Sheridan, Orr, Drapeau, and Gardner, where he remained until the publication of his first Perry Mason novel in 1933.[''Current Biography 1944'', pp. 224–226]
Gardner enjoyed litigation and the development of trial strategy but was otherwise bored by legal practice. In his spare time, he began writing for pulp magazines
Pulp magazines (also referred to as "the pulps") were inexpensive fiction magazines that were published from 1896 to the late 1950s. The term "pulp" derives from the cheap wood pulp paper on which the magazines were printed. In contrast, magazine ...
. His first story, ''The Police in the House'', was published in June 1921 in ''Breezy'' magazine. He created many series characters for the pulps, including the ingenious Lester Leith, a parody of the "gentleman thief" in the tradition of A. J. Raffles
Arthur J. Raffles (usually called A. J. Raffles) is a fictional character created in 1898 by E. W. Hornung, brother-in-law of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, the creator of Sherlock Holmes. Raffles is, in many ways, an inversion of Holmeshe is a "gentle ...
; and Ken Corning, crusading lawyer, crime sleuth, and archetype for his most successful creation, Perry Mason. While the Perry Mason novels seldom delved deeply into characters' lives, the novels were rich in plot detail which was reality-based and drawn from his own experience. In his early years writing for the pulp magazine market, Gardner set himself a quota of 1,200,000 words a year. Early on, he typed stories himself, using two fingers, but later dictated them to a team of secretaries.
Under the pen name A. A. Fair, Gardner wrote a series of novels about the private detective firm Cool and Lam. In another series, district attorney Doug Selby
Doug Selby is a fictional creation of Erle Stanley Gardner. He appears in nine books, most originally serialized in magazines. He was portrayed by Jim Hutton in a 1971 television movie, ''They Call It Murder'', loosely based on ''The D.A. Draws ...
litigated against attorney Alphonse Baker Carr in an inversion of the Perry Mason scenario. Prosecutor Selby is portrayed as a courageous and imaginative crime solver; his antagonist Carr is a wily shyster whose clients are invariably "as guilty as hell".
Much of the first Perry Mason novel,''The Case of the Velvet Claws,'' published in 1933, is set at the historic Pierpont Inn
The Pierpont Inn is a Craftsman bungalow-style Inn in Ventura, California on a bluff overlooking the Santa Barbara Channel. Built in 1910 for motoring tourists, the complex is City of San Buenaventura Historic Landmark Number 80.
The Pierpont I ...
near Gardner's old law office in Ventura, California. In 1937, Gardner moved to Temecula, California
Temecula (; es, Temécula, ; Luiseño: ''Temeekunga'') is a city in southwestern Riverside County, California, United States. The city had a population of 110,003 as of the 2020 census and was incorporated on December 1, 1989. The city is a t ...
, where he lived for the rest of his life. With the success of the ''Mason'' series, more than 80 novels, Gardner gradually reduced his contributions to the pulp magazines until the medium died in the 1950s. Thereafter, he published a few short stories in the "glossies," such as ''Collier's
''Collier's'' was an American general interest magazine founded in 1888 by Peter Fenelon Collier. It was launched as ''Collier's Once a Week'', then renamed in 1895 as ''Collier's Weekly: An Illustrated Journal'', shortened in 1905 to ''Collie ...
'', ''Sports Afield
''Sports Afield'' (SA) is an American outdoor magazine headquartered in Huntington Beach, California. Founded in 1887 by Claude King as a hunting and fishing magazine, it is the oldest published outdoor magazine in North America. The first issue, ...
'', and '' Look'', but most of his postwar magazine contributions were nonfiction articles on travel, Western
Western may refer to:
Places
*Western, Nebraska, a village in the US
*Western, New York, a town in the US
*Western Creek, Tasmania, a locality in Australia
*Western Junction, Tasmania, a locality in Australia
*Western world, countries that id ...
history, and forensic science. Gardner's readership was a broad and international one, including the English novelist Evelyn Waugh
Arthur Evelyn St. John Waugh (; 28 October 1903 – 10 April 1966) was an English writer of novels, biographies, and travel books; he was also a prolific journalist and book reviewer. His most famous works include the early satires ''Decli ...
, who in 1949 called Gardner the best living American writer. He also created characters for various radio programs, including ''Christopher London'' (1950), starring Glenn Ford
Gwyllyn Samuel Newton "Glenn" Ford (May 1, 1916 – August 30, 2006) was a Canadian-American actor who often portrayed ordinary men in unusual circumstances. Ford was most prominent during Classical Hollywood cinema, Hollywood's Golden Age as ...
, and ''A Life in Your Hands'' (1949–1952).
Gardner's character Perry Mason was a recurring character in a series of Hollywood films in the 1930s, and then for the radio program ''Perry Mason'', which ran from 1943 to 1955. In 1954, CBS
CBS Broadcasting Inc., commonly shortened to CBS, the abbreviation of its former legal name Columbia Broadcasting System, is an American commercial broadcast television and radio network serving as the flagship property of the CBS Entertainm ...
proposed transforming ''Perry Mason'' into a TV soap opera. When Gardner opposed the idea, CBS created ''The Edge of Night
''The Edge of Night'' is an American television mystery crime drama series and soap opera, created by Irving Vendig and produced by Procter & Gamble Productions.
It debuted on CBS on April 2, 1956, and ran as a live broadcast on that networ ...
'', featuring John Larkin—who voiced Mason on the radio show—as a thinly veiled imitation of the Mason character. Perry Mason’s character was inspired by Earl Rogers
Earl Rogers (November 18, 1869 – February 22, 1922) was an American trial lawyer and professor, who later became the inspiration for Perry Mason.
Life
Earl Rogers was born in Perry, New York on November 18, 1869, the son of Methodist ministe ...
, a trial attorney who appeared in 77 murder trials but lost only three. He was recognized for the extensive use of demonstratives, e.g., visuals, charts and diagrams, during trial before it became common practice. Rogers is famous for his defense of, and attorney-client disagreement with, Clarence Darrow
Clarence Seward Darrow (; April 18, 1857 – March 13, 1938) was an American lawyer who became famous in the early 20th century for his involvement in the Leopold and Loeb murder trial and the Scopes "Monkey" Trial. He was a leading member of t ...
, a fellow attorney who was charged with attempted jury bribery in 1912.
In 1957, ''Perry Mason
Perry Mason is a fictional character, an American criminal defense lawyer who is the main character in works of detective fiction written by Erle Stanley Gardner. Perry Mason features in 82 novels and 4 short stories, all of which involve a cli ...
'' became a long-running CBS-TV courtroom drama series, starring Raymond Burr
Raymond William Stacy Burr (May 21, 1917September 12, 1993) was a Canadian actor known for his lengthy Hollywood film career and his title roles in television dramas ''Perry Mason'' and '' Ironside''.
Burr's early acting career included roles ...
in the title role. Burr had auditioned for the role of the district attorney Hamilton Burger
Hamilton Burger is the fictional Los Angeles County District Attorney (D.A.) in the long-running series of novels, films, and radio and television programs featuring Perry Mason, the fictional defense attorney created by Erle Stanley Gardner.
...
, but Gardner reportedly declared he was the embodiment of Perry Mason. Gardner made an uncredited appearance as a judge in "The Case of the Final Fade-Out" (1966), the last episode of the series.
He had a lifelong fascination with Baja California
Baja California (; 'Lower California'), officially the Free and Sovereign State of Baja California ( es, Estado Libre y Soberano de Baja California), is a state in Mexico. It is the northernmost and westernmost of the 32 federal entities of Mex ...
and wrote a series of nonfiction travel accounts describing his extensive explorations of the peninsula by boat, truck, airplane, and helicopter.
Gardner devoted thousands of hours to the Court of Last Resort, in collaboration with his many friends in the forensic, legal, and investigative communities. The project sought to review and, when appropriate, reverse miscarriages of justice
A miscarriage of justice occurs when a grossly unfair outcome occurs in a criminal or civil proceeding, such as the conviction and punishment of a person for a crime they did not commit. Miscarriages are also known as wrongful convictions. Inno ...
against criminal defendants who had been convicted because of poor legal representation, abuse, misinterpretation of forensic evidence, or careless or malicious actions of police or prosecutors. The resulting 1952 book earned Gardner his only Edgar Award
The Edgar Allan Poe Awards, popularly called the Edgars, are presented every year by the Mystery Writers of America, based in New York City. Named after American writer Edgar Allan Poe (1809–1849), a pioneer in the genre, the awards honor the bes ...
, in the Best Fact Crime category, and was later made into a TV series, ''The Court of Last Resort
''The Court of Last Resort '' is an American television dramatized court show which aired October 4, 1957 – April 11, 1958, on NBC. It was co-produced by Erle Stanley Gardner's Paisano Productions, which also brought forth the long-running hit ...
''.
Personal life
In 1912, Gardner wed Natalie Frances Talbert (16 July 1885 – 26 February 1968). Their only child, Natalie Grace Gardner[ (January 25, 1913 — 29 February 2004), was born in Ventura, California. Gardner and his wife separated in the early 1930s, but did not divorce, and in fact their marriage lasted 56 years, until Natalie's death in 1968. After that, Gardner married his secretary, Agnes "Jean" Bethell (]née
A birth name is the name of a person given upon birth. The term may be applied to the surname, the given name, or the entire name. Where births are required to be officially registered, the entire name entered onto a birth certificate or birth re ...
Walter; 19 May 1902 – 5 December 2002), the daughter of Ida Mary Elizabeth Walter (née Itrich; 24 December 1880 – 3 March 1961).
Through his daughter, Gardner had two grandchildren: Valerie Joan Naso (née McKittrick; 19 August 1941 – 12 November 2007) and Alan G. McKittrick.
Gardner's widow died in 2002, aged 100, in San Diego. She was a member of Jehovah's Witnesses
Jehovah's Witnesses is a millenarian restorationist Christian denomination with nontrinitarian beliefs distinct from mainstream Christianity. The group reports a worldwide membership of approximately 8.7 million adherents involved in ...
. She was survived by her brother, Norman Walter.
Death and legacy
Gardner died of cancer, diagnosed in the late 1960s, on March 11, 1970, at his ranch in Temecula. At the time of his death, he was the best-selling American writer of the 20th century.[ His death followed by five days that of ]William Hopper
William DeWolf Hopper Jr. (January 26, 1915 – March 6, 1970) was an American stage, film, and television actor. The only child of actor DeWolf Hopper and actress and Hollywood columnist Hedda Hopper, he appeared in predominantly minor ro ...
, who played private detective Paul Drake in the ''Perry Mason'' TV series. Gardner was cremated and his ashes scattered over his beloved Baja California peninsula. The ranch, known as Rancho del Paisano at the time, was sold after his death, then resold in 2001 to the Pechanga Indians, renamed Great Oak Ranch, and eventually absorbed into the Pechanga reservation.
The Harry Ransom Center
The Harry Ransom Center (until 1983 the Humanities Research Center) is an archive, library and museum at the University of Texas at Austin, specializing in the collection of literary and cultural artifacts from the Americas and Europe for the pur ...
at the University of Texas at Austin
The University of Texas at Austin (UT Austin, UT, or Texas) is a public research university in Austin, Texas. It was founded in 1883 and is the oldest institution in the University of Texas System. With 40,916 undergraduate students, 11,075 ...
holds Gardner's manuscripts, art collection, and personal effects. From 1972 to 2010, the Ransom Center featured a full-scale reproduction of Gardner's study that displayed original furnishings, personal memorabilia, and artifacts. The space and a companion exhibition were dismantled, but a panoramic view of the study is available online.
In 2003, a new school in the Temecula Valley Unified School District
Temecula Valley Unified School District is a school district located in the southwestern portion of Riverside County, California, serving the city of Temecula and unincorporated parts of nearby Murrieta and French Valley. It is the fourth-largest ...
was named Erle Stanley Gardner Middle School.
In December 2016, Hard Case Crime published ''The Knife Slipped'', a Bertha Cool–Donald Lam mystery, which had been lost for 75 years. Written in 1939 as the second entry in the Cool and Lam series, the book was rejected at the time by Gardner's publisher. Published for the first time in 2016 as a trade paperback and ebook, the work garnered respectful reviews. In 2017, Hard Case Crime followed the publication of ''The Knife Slipped'' with a reissued edition of ''Turn On the Heat'', the book Gardner wrote to replace ''The Knife Slipped'', and published a new edition of ''The Count of Nine'' in October 2018.
Bibliography
Cultural references
An unspecified article that Gardner wrote for ''True
True most commonly refers to truth, the state of being in congruence with fact or reality.
True may also refer to:
Places
* True, West Virginia, an unincorporated community in the United States
* True, Wisconsin, a town in the United States
* Tr ...
'' magazine is referred to by William S. Burroughs
William Seward Burroughs II (; February 5, 1914 – August 2, 1997) was an American writer and visual artist, widely considered a primary figure of the Beat Generation and a major postmodern author who influenced popular cultur ...
in his 1959 novel, ''Naked Lunch
''Naked Lunch'' (sometimes ''The Naked Lunch'') is a 1959 novel by American writer William S. Burroughs. The book is structured as a series of loosely connected vignettes, intended by Burroughs to be read in any order. The reader follows the narr ...
''.
Gardner's name is well-known among avid crossword puzzle
A crossword is a word puzzle that usually takes the form of a square or a rectangular grid of white- and black-shaded squares. The goal is to fill the white squares with letters, forming words or phrases, by solving clues which lead to the answ ...
solvers, because his first name contains an unusual series of common letters, starting and ending with the most common letter of the English alphabet, and because few other famous people have that name. As of January 2012, he is noted for having the highest ratio (5.31) of mentions in the ''New York Times'' crossword puzzle to mentions in the rest of the newspaper among all other people since 1993.
In 2001, Huell Howser
Huell Burnley Howser (October 18, 1945 – January 7, 2013) was an American television personality, actor, producer, writer, singer, and voice artist, best known for hosting, producing, and writing ''California's Gold'' and his human interest sh ...
Productions, in association with KCET
KCET (channel 28) is a secondary PBS member television station in Los Angeles, California, United States. It is owned by the Public Media Group of Southern California alongside the market's primary PBS member, Huntington Beach–licensed KOCE-TV ...
, Los Angeles, featured Gardner's Temecula Rancho del Paisano in ''California's Gold
''California's Gold'' is a public television human interest program that explores the natural, cultural, and historical features of California. The series ran for 24 seasons beginning in 1991, and was produced and hosted by Huell Howser in colla ...
''. The 30-minute program is available as a VHS videorecording.
References
Further reading
* Fugate, Francis L. and Roberta B. (1980). ''Secrets of the World's Best-Selling Writer: The Story Telling Techniques of Erle Stanley Gardner''. New York: William Morrow. .
* Hughes, Dorothy B. (1978). ''Erle Stanley Gardner: The Case of the Real Perry Mason''. New York: William Morrow. .
* Johnston, Alva (1947). ''The Case of Erle Stanley Gardner''. New York: William Morrow.
* Mundell, E. H. (1968). ''Erle Stanley Gardner: A Checklist''. Kent, Ohio: Kent State University Press. .
* Senate, Richard L. ''Erle Stanley Gardner's Ventura: Birthplace of Perry Mason''. Ventura, California: Citation Press. .
External links
*
Erle Stanley Gardner Study
at the Harry Ransom Center
The Harry Ransom Center (until 1983 the Humanities Research Center) is an archive, library and museum at the University of Texas at Austin, specializing in the collection of literary and cultural artifacts from the Americas and Europe for the pur ...
, University of Texas at Austin
The University of Texas at Austin (UT Austin, UT, or Texas) is a public research university in Austin, Texas. It was founded in 1883 and is the oldest institution in the University of Texas System. With 40,916 undergraduate students, 11,075 ...
Erle Stanley Gardner
at Thrilling Detective
*
* ttps://books.google.com/books?id=jCkDAAAAMBAJ&printsec=frontcover&source=gbs_summary_r&cad=0_0#PPA102,M1 Erle Stanley Gardner searching for lost minesin Popular Science
''Popular Science'' (also known as ''PopSci'') is an American digital magazine carrying popular science content, which refers to articles for the general reader on science and technology subjects. ''Popular Science'' has won over 58 awards, incl ...
magazine
Episodes of ''A Life in Your Hands'', a radio program created by Gardner, in the public domain
Episodes of ''Christopher London'', a radio program created by Gardner, in the public domain
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Gardner, Erle Stanley
1889 births
1970 deaths
American mystery writers
20th-century American novelists
California lawyers
Writers from California
Edgar Award winners
Palo Alto High School alumni
People from Malden, Massachusetts
People from Ventura, California
People from Temecula, California
Perry Mason
Novelists from Massachusetts
American male novelists
20th-century American short story writers
American male short story writers
Western (genre) writers
20th-century American male writers