Erastus Flavel Beadle

Erastus Flavel Beadle (1821-1894)

Erastus Flavel Beadle (September 9, 1821 – December 18, 1894) was an American printer and pioneer in publishing pulp fiction.

Biography

He was born in Otsego County, New York, United States, in 1821. He had a sibling: Irwin Pedro Beadle (1826-1882). They were the grandsons of Benjamin Beadle, a Revolutionary War soldier. After a temporary move to Michigan, the Beadle family returned to New York, and lived in Chautauqua County, New York. Erastus worked for a miller named Hayes, where he began his printing career when cutting wooden letters to label bags of grain. In 1838, he was apprenticed to H & E Phinney, a publishing firm in Cooperstown, New York. There he learned typesetting, stereotyping, binding, and engraving. He married Mary Ann Pennington in 1846, and in 1847 the couple moved to Buffalo, New York, where Erastus worked as a stereotyper. In 1849 Irwin went to Buffalo too, and found a job as a bookbinder. The next year, the brothers set up their own stereotype foundry. Irwin left the company in 1856 and went to the Nebraska Territory where he acted as a secretary for a company settling the town of Saratoga. The town was busted in 1857, and Beadle returned to Nebraska shortly thereafter.

Erastus retired to Cooperstown, New York, in 1889, where he died on December 18, 1894.

Archive

His papers are archived at the University of Delaware.

Books

• To Nebraska in 1857: A Diary of E. F. Beadle.
• California Joe, the Mysterious Plainsman: The Strange Adventures of an Unknown Man, whose real identity, like that of the "Man of the Iron Mask," is still unsolved.
• Adventures of Buffalo Bill from Boyhood to Manhood. Deeds of Daring, Scenes of Thrilling, Peril, and Romantic Incidents In the Early Life of W. F. Cody, the Monarch of Bordermen.

External links

• Nickels & Dimes (Northern Illinois digitized dime novel database)
• Northern Illinois University Libraries' Beadle and Adams project
• University of Delaware archive

References

• The New York Times; February 29, 1884, Wednesday; A singular case of domestic misery was brought up for settlement in Judge Massey's court, Brooklyn, yesterday. The wife of Irwin F. Beadle, a son of Erastus Beadle, the dime novel publisher, sues him for abandonment. The couple were married about nine years ago, and ...
• The New York Times; December 20, 1894, Wednesday; Erastus Flavius Beadle. Erastus Flavius Beadle, the senior member of the publishing house of Beadle Adams, died at his home in Cooperstown, New York, Tuesday night. Mr. Beadle was born in Otsego County in 1821.