Edgar Rice Burroughs was an American Author best known for his jungle hero Tarzan and John Carter of Mars. Burroughs wrote popular science fiction and fantasy stories involving Earthly adventures transported to various planets (notably Barsoom, Burroughs' fictional name for Mars, and Amor, his fictional name for Venus), lost islands, and into the interior of the hollow earth in his Pellucidar stories, as well as westerns and historical romances. Along with the All-Story, many of his stories were published in the Argosy Magazine.
Tarzan was a cultural sensation when introduced. Burroughs was determined to capitalize on Tarzan's popularity in every way possible. He planned to exploit Tarzan through several different media including a syndicted Tarzan comic strip, movies and merchandise. Experts in the field advised against this course of action, stating that the different media would just end up competing against each other. Burroughs went ahead, however , and proved the experts wrong - the public wanted Tarzan in whatever fashion he was offered. Tarzan remains one of the most successful fictional characters to this day and is an cultural icon.
In 1923 Burroughs set up his own company, Edgar Rice Burroughs, Inc., and began
printing his own books through the 1930s. He divorced Emma in 1934 and married former actress Florence Gilbert Dearholt in 1935, ex-wife of his friend, Ashton Dearholt, adopting the Dearholts' two children. They divorced in 1942.
At the time of the atttack on Pearl Harbor he was a resident of Hawaii and, despite
being in his late sixties, he asked permission to be a war correspondent. This
permission was granted and so he became the oldest war correspondent for the
U.S. during World War II. After the war ended, Burroughs moved back to Encino,
California, where, after many health problems, he died of a heart attack.
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Stephen Vlahos