Richard Connell was a prolific writer in the first several decades of the twentieth century. He was born October 17,1893, in a New York state community near the Hudson River, not far from Theodore Roosevelt's homestead. He started his writing ca reer early, working as a reporter for the Poughkeepsie News-Press while still in high school. He spent a year at Georgetown College (now University) in Washington, D.C. while working as a secretary for his father, who was a member of Congress. When his father died in 1912, Connell moved back East to attend Harvard University. There he exercised his interest in writing by serving as an editor for both the Daily Crimson and the Lampoon, a precursor to the popular National Lampoon satire magazine. Around this time he also worked as a reporter for the New York American newspaper and served in World War I.

Throughout...