Gordon Young (1886 – February 10, 1948) was an American writer of adventure and western stories.

Life

Young was born in

Ray County, Missouri Ray County is a county located in the northwestern portion of the U.S. state of Missouri and is part of the Kansas City metropolitan area. As of the 2020 census, the population was 23,158. Its county seat is Richmond. The county was organized N ...

.P. R. Meldrum, "Young, Gordon (Ray)" in ''Twentieth Century Western Writers'', edited by Geoff Sadler. St. James Press, 1991, ,(pp. 743–44)Tom Krabacher, "Gordon Ray Young:Forgotten Adventurer", in ''Blood N' Thunder'' Magazine Summer 2010, (p.60-78). He worked as a cowboy and served in the

United States Marine Corps The United States Marine Corps (USMC), also referred to as the United States Marines, is the maritime land force service branch of the United States Armed Forces responsible for conducting expeditionary and amphibious operations through combi ...

in the

Philippines The Philippines (; fil, Pilipinas, links=no), officially the Republic of the Philippines ( fil, Republika ng Pilipinas, links=no), * bik, Republika kan Filipinas * ceb, Republika sa Pilipinas * cbk, República de Filipinas * hil, Republ ...

, before moving to

Los Angeles Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the largest city in the state of California and the second most populous city in the United States after New York City, as well as one of the world' ...

and taking a job at the ''

Los Angeles Times The ''Los Angeles Times'' (abbreviated as ''LA Times'') is a daily newspaper that started publishing in Los Angeles in 1881. Based in the LA-adjacent suburb of El Segundo since 2018, it is the sixth-largest newspaper by circulation in the Un ...

'' in 1914. During his time in Los Angeles, Young befriended the writer

Paul Jordan-Smith Paul Jordan-Smith (April 19, 1885 – June 17, 1971) was an American Universalist minister who also worked as a writer, lecturer and editor. Academically, he is regarded as one of the foremost authorities on the 17th-century British author an ...

and the painter

Edward Middleton Manigault Edward Middleton Manigault (June 14, 1887 – August 31, 1922) was a Canadian-born American Modernist painter. Biography Manigault was born in London, Ontario, on June 14, 1887.. His parents were Americans originally from South Carolina who had ...

. Young eventually became Literary Editor of the ''

''; one of his correspondents was

Sinclair Lewis Harry Sinclair Lewis (February 7, 1885 – January 10, 1951) was an American writer and playwright. In 1930, he became the first writer from the United States (and the first from the Americas) to receive the Nobel Prize in Literature, which was ...

. He died of a heart attack in Los Angeles, February 10, 1948.

Writing career

Young's first published story was "The Lady's Picture", in ''The Cavalier'' magazine, in March 1913. Gordon Young began writing fiction for the magazine ''

Adventure An adventure is an exciting experience or undertaking that is typically bold, sometimes risky. Adventures may be activities with danger such as traveling, exploring, skydiving, mountain climbing, scuba diving, river rafting, or other extreme spo ...

'' in 1917. Young's first stories for ''Adventure'' were a series of crime thrillers about a gun-wielding gambler, Don Everhard. Magazine historian Robert Sampson argued the Don Everhard stories influenced later writers of

Hardboiled Hardboiled (or hard-boiled) fiction is a literary genre that shares some of its characters and settings with crime fiction (especially detective fiction and noir fiction). The genre's typical protagonist is a detective who battles the violence o ...

crime fiction such as

Carroll John Daly Carroll John Daly (1889–1958) was a writer of crime fiction. Early life Daly was born on September 14, 1889, in Yonkers, New York. Career Daly has been credited with creating the first hard-boiled story, "The False Burton Combs", published in ...

. Young soon became one of the most popular of Arthur Sullivant Hoffman's roster of authors for ''Adventure''. He followed the Everhard stories with a series of

South Seas Today the term South Seas, or South Sea, is used in several contexts. Most commonly it refers to the portion of the Pacific Ocean south of the equator. In 1513, when Spanish conquistador Vasco Núñez de Balboa coined the term ''Mar del Sur'', ...

tales about Hurricane Williams, an adventurer who shuns "civilized" society.Robert Kenneth Jones. ''The Lure of Adventure''. Starmont House, 1989 (pp. 12–14). Young's novel, ''Days of '49'' (1925), a historical narrative about the settlement of California during the

Gold Rush A gold rush or gold fever is a discovery of gold—sometimes accompanied by other precious metals and rare-earth minerals—that brings an onrush of miners seeking their fortune. Major gold rushes took place in the 19th century in Australia, New Z ...

, was well received by contemporary reviewers.

James Oliver Curwood James Oliver Curwood (June 12, 1878 – August 13, 1927) was an American action-adventure writer and conservationist. His books were often based on adventures set in the Hudson Bay area, the Yukon or Alaska and ranked among the top-ten best sell ...

declared that ''Days of '49'' was "the best book he had read for ten years", while Edwin Bjorkman compared Young's work to that of

Walter Scott Sir Walter Scott, 1st Baronet (15 August 1771 – 21 September 1832), was a Scottish novelist, poet, playwright and historian. Many of his works remain classics of European and Scottish literature, notably the novels ''Ivanhoe'', ''Rob Roy (n ...

. ''Huroc the Avenger'' is a historical adventure set in the seventeenth century, and revolves around the titular hero's quest for revenge against a ruthless Venetian trading family. Young's humorous Westerns about "Red" Clark, became his most commercially successful series; these tales first appeared in ''Adventure'' and ''

Short Stories A short story is a piece of prose fiction that typically can be read in one sitting and focuses on a self-contained incident or series of linked incidents, with the intent of evoking a single effect or mood. The short story is one of the oldest t ...

'' before being collected in book form. The Clark stories were especially popular in Britain and most of the stories appeared in hardbacks for the UK library market. Several of Gordon Young's stories were adapted for the cinema, including the 1936 film '' Captain Calamity'' and the 1944 film '' Tall in the Saddle''.*

References

* * * *

Bibliography

*''Savages'' (1921) *''Wild Blood'' (1921) *''Hurricane Williams'' (1922) *''Crooked Shadows'' (1924) *''Seibert of the Island'' (1925) *''Vengeance of Hurricane Williams'' (1925) *''Days of '49'' (1925) *''Pearl-Hunger'' (1927) *''Treasure'' (1928) *''Fighting Blood'' (UK Title: ''The Fighting Fool'') (1932) *''Devil's Passport'' (1933) *''Red Clark o' Tulluco'' (1933) *''Red Clark Rides Alone'' (1933) *''Red Clark of the Arrowhead'' (1935) *''Huroc the Avenger'' (1936) *''Red Clark on the border'' (1937) *''Red Clark, Range Boss'' (UK Title: ''Red Clark, Boss!'') (1938) *''Red Clark, Two-Gun Man'' (1939) *''Red Clark for Luck'' (1940) *''Mr. Beamish'' (1940) *''Red Clark takes a hand'' (1941) *''Iron Rainbow'' (1942) *''Tall In the Saddle'' (1943) *''Holster Law: Red Clark on the Frontier'' (1946) *''Red Clark at the showdown'' (1947) *''Red Clark in Paradise'' (1947) *''Quarter Horse'' (1948) *''Red Clark to the rescue'' (1948) *''Wanted-Dead Or Alive!'' (1949) *''Fast on the Draw'' (1950) *''Hell on Hoofs'' (1952) (with ''The Brazos Firebrand'' by Leslie Scott) Gordon Young writing as "Paull Steward" : *''Dangerous Men'' (1926) *''Gaboreau'' (1927) *''Garoreau the Terrible'' (1927)

External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Young, Gordon 1886 births 1948 deaths 20th-century American male writers 20th-century American novelists 20th-century American short story writers American crime fiction writers American historical novelists American male novelists American male short story writers Novelists from Missouri People from Ray County, Missouri Pulp fiction writers United States Marines Western (genre) writers Writers from Los Angeles Writers of historical fiction set in the early modern period Writers of historical fiction set in the modern age