White, Stewart Edward

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Stewart Edward White
Stewart Edward White, 1912
Born	March 12, 1873(1873-03-12) Grand Rapids, Michigan, Michigan, USA
Died	September 18, 1946(1946-09-18) (aged 73) Hillsborough, California
Occupation	Author
Nationality	American
Alma mater	University of Michigan
Period	1901 to 1940
Genres	Paranormal, adventure, travel
Literary movement	New Age
Notable work(s)	The Unobstructed Universe

Stewart Edward White (12 March 1873 – September 18, 1946) was an American author.

Born in Grand Rapids, Michigan he earned degrees from University of Michigan (B.A., 1895; M.A., 1903).

From about 1900 until about 1922, he wrote fiction and non-fiction about adventure and travel, with an emphasis on natural history and outdoor living. Starting in 1922, he and his wife Elizabeth "Betty" Grant White wrote numerous books they claimed were received through channelling with spirits. They also wrote of their travels around the state of California. White died in Hillsborough, California.

White's books were popular at a time when America was losing its vanishing wilderness. He was a keen observer of the beauties of nature and human nature, yet could render them in a plain-spoken style. Based on his own experience, whether writing camping journals or Westerns, he included pithy and fun details about cabin-building, canoeing, logging, gold-hunting, and guns and fishing and hunting. He also interviewed people who had been involved in the fur trade, the California gold rush and other pioneers which provided him with details that give his novels verisimilitude. He salted in humor and sympathy for colorful characters such as canny Indian guides and "greenhorn" campers who carried too much gear. White also illustrated some of his books with his own photographs.

[edit] Quotes

Here's a sample passage from THE CABIN of 1911, the chapter "On Strangers".

Whenever you see a dust through the trees, you look first to make sure it is not raised by stray cattle. Then when you are certain of your horse and man, you start a fire in the little stove. That is the invariable rule in the [California] mountains.

The logic is simple, unanswerable, and correct. The presence of the man argues that he has ridden from some distant point, for here all points are more or less distant; and the fact in turn proves that somewhat of exercise and space have intervened last he has eaten. Therefore, no matter what the time of day, you feed him. It works out like a mathematical formula.

Similarly in other camps, after you have chatted for a few moments, some one will slip quietly away. A sound of splitting crackles, a thin, fragrant smoke odour enters your nostrils. After an interval there is brought to you a lunch to which your attention is invited. The lunch varies from beans to a tin plate and rank coffee in a tin cup, to tea and yeast-bread, and gooseberry jelly and layer cake, according to whose camp you may happen to be in. But its welcome is the same, and you find yourself responding avidly at ten o'clock in the morning to the cordial invitation, "eat hearty". Such is mountain hospitality and mountain convention. It is as much a matter of course as the urban ring at the door bell, and is no more to be omitted than the offer of a chair.

"Light and rest yo' hat"; "Eat hearty"; "Take care of yoreself." These three speeches can cover the entire gamut of good-fellowship - greeting, entertainment, and good-bye.

[edit] Honors

In 1927, the Boy Scouts of America made White an Honorary Scout, a new category of Scout created that same year. This distinction was give to "American citizens whose achievements in outdoor activity, exploration and worthwhile adventure are of such an exceptional character as to capture the imagination of boys...". The other eighteen who were awarded this distinction were: Roy Chapman Andrews; Robert Bartlett; Frederick Russell Burnham; Richard E. Byrd; George Kruck Cherrie; James L. Clark; Merian C. Cooper; Lincoln Ellsworth; Louis Agassiz Fuertes; George Bird Grinnell; Charles A. Lindbergh; Donald Baxter MacMillan; Clifford H. Pope; George P. Putnam; Kermit Roosevelt; Carl Rungius; Orville Wright.^[1]

[edit] Works

• The Westerners (1901)
• The Claim Jumpers (1901)
• Conjurer's House (1903)
• The Forest (1903)
• Blazed Trail Stories (1904)
• The Mountains (1904)
• The Silent Places (1904)
• The Pass (1906), with S. H. Adams
• The Mystery (1907), with S. H. Adams
• Arizona Nights (1907)
• The Riverman (1908)
• The Cabin (1910)
• The Rules of the Game (1910)
• The Land of Footprints (1912)
• African Camp Fires (1913)
• Gold (1913)
• The Gray Dawn (1915)
• The Rose Dawn (1920)
• Rediscovered Country (1915)
• The forty-niners; a chronicle of the California trail and El Dorado (1918)
• The Killer (1919)
• Daniel Boone, wilderness scout (1922)
• Lions in the path; a book of adventure on the high veldt (1926)
• Back of Beyond (1926)
• Dog days, other times, other dogs; the autobiography of a man and his dog friends through four decades of changing America (1930)
• Pole Star (1935), with Harry DeVighne
• The Betty Book (1939)
• Across the Unknown [with Harwood White] (1939)
• The Unobstructed Universe (1940)
• The Road I Know (1942)
• Anchors to Windward
• The Stars are Still There
• With Folded Wings (1947)

The Sign at Six (1912) Wild Geese Calling (1940) Secret Harbour (1926) The Adventures of Bobby Orde (1910)

See also Project Gutenberg for more titles.
The Long Rifle" (1932) (This is a compilation covering the western movement from Kentucky to California. Last printed in 1987)

[edit] Notes

Also Wrote:

The Long Rifle (1930) Ranchero (1933) Folded Hills (1932) Stampede (1942)

These 4 books comprise "The Saga of Andy Burnett," which follows a young Pennsylvania farm boy who escapes his overbearing step father by running away to the West. He leaves with his grandmother's blessing and "The Boone Gun", the original Kentucky rifle carried by Daniel Boone. He soon encounters a mountain man, Joe Crane, who undertakes the mentoring of Andy in the ways of survival in the wild. The remainder of the saga follows Andy as he moves west ultimately settling in California which is the setting of the last three books. This series would be considered historical fiction since it incorporates actual events and characters from the time period in the narrative. The four stories were published as a posthumous volume, The Saga of Andy Burnett, in 1947. This was adapted into several episodes of The Wonderful World of Disney during 1957 and 1958, starring Jerome Courtland as Andy Burnett and Jeff (Mike Fink) Yorke as his friend and mentor Joe Crane. This series was in many ways a follow-up to Disney's much more successful Davy Crockett.

[edit] References

• J. C. Underwood, Literature and Insurgency (New York, 1914)
• Staff report (September 19, 1946). STEWART E. WHITE, NOVELIST, IS DEAD; Author of Stories of Adventure and Frontier Life Was 73—Stricken After Fabled Career CHOKED LEOPARD TO DEATH Writer of 'Blazed Trail' Knew Yukon, Africa and West—Honored as Geographer
• "Stewart White, Adventurer and novelist, dies; books captured thrills of own exciting life." Chicago Tribune, September 19, 1946

[edit] External links

Wikisource has original text related to this article: Stewart Edward White

• Stewart Edward White at the Internet Movie Database
• Stewart Edward White Biography
• Works by Stewart Edward White at Project Gutenberg
• Works by Stewart Edward White at LibriVox (audiobooks)
• Guide to the Stewart Edward White Manuscripts at The Bancroft Library