Erastus Flavel Beadle was an American printer and pioneer in publishing pulp fiction.
Biography
Erastus was born in Otsego County, New York, United States, in 1821, and had a brother, Irwin Pedro Beadle, who assisted him in various business undertakings. They were the grandsons of Benjamin Beadle, a Revolutionary War soldier. After a hiatus in Michigan, the Beadle family removed 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, in 1850, the Beadle 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 New York shortly thereafter.
Books for the millions
In 1860, after finally settling down in Brooklyn, Irwin came with an idea to publish, first, ten-cent booklets, and then, a series of paper-covered novels at the same price, which brought him recognition and commercial success. On June 7, 1860, the New-York Tribune advertised the first book in the dime novel series, Indian Wife of the White Hunter written by Ann S. Stephens by printing the following, "Books for the Millions! A dollar book for the dime. 128 pages complete, only Ten Cents!!! Beadle's dime novels No. 1 Maleska." Many established as well as aspiring writers took part in the project geared towards the masses, including William Jared Hall, Frances Fuller Victor, John Neal, Mayne Reid, A. J. H. Duganne, Edward S. Ellis, William Reynolds Eyster, William W. Busteed, James L. Bowen, Mary A. Denison, Charles Dunning Clark, among others. Orville James Victor served for nearly thirty years as the series' editor.
Later life
Erastus retired to Cooperstown, New York, in 1889, where he died on December 18, 1894.
Recognition
At first, dime novels were denounced as "pernicious and evil" by literary purists. At the beginning of the twentieth century, in July 1907, Charles M. Harvey, a critic, changed the prevailing attitudes after publishing in the Atlantic Monthly a reflective piece titled, The Dime Novel in American Life. He stated there, In the middle of the same century, Erastus F. Beadle was posthumously recognized as a Dime Novel King. His papers are archived at the University of Delaware.
