Tuesday, July 17, 2007

Happy Birthday Erle Stanley Gardner!

The Writer's Almanac from American Public Media: "It's the birthday of American mystery writer Erle Stanley Gardner (books by this author), born in Malden, Massachusetts (1889). He wrote over 80 mystery novels featuring the brilliant lawyer, Perry Mason. He was the best-selling American author of all time. He sold over 200 million copies of his books, and at the peak of his success he sold about 26,000 books a day."

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

SOMEbody inherited all that money. Why isn't there a Paris Stanley Gardner out there, running the Court Of Last Resort with great-grandpa's stash, making Rocky Delgadillo's life a nightmare by destroying his cases at the preliminary hearing, like a REAL lawyer should?

mybillcrider said...

You have to wonder where all that money went. I like the idea of Paris Stanley Gardner.

James Reasoner said...

I had no idea it was Erle Stanley Gardner's birthday, but this morning I started reading THE CASE OF THE SUN BATHER'S DIARY. A happy coincidence, I guess.

mybillcrider said...

I hope it has a GGA cover.

James Reasoner said...

Yeah, but not by McGinnis, more's the pity. The edition I'm reading is the first paperback, from February 1958, with a Mitchell Hooks cover.

Brent McKee said...

Apparently there was a daughter but Gardner was estranged from his first wife from 1935 until her death somewhere around 1968. At that point he married his secretary Agnes Bethell (described as "the real Della Street") who died in 2002 at age 100. (Thank you Wikipedia!)

mybillcrider said...

And thanks for looking it up for us.