ERLE STANLEY GARDNER  by  William F. Nolan                                                        Page Number Four

Actually, it was Black Mask's assistant editor, Harry North, whosaw potential in this new writer. Gardner called him "a patient cuss with something of a sense of humor. ... He'd give me coaching on the margin of rejection slips and in short personal letters (Hughes, p. 79)."

In 1924 Gardner had nine short stories and three novelettes printed in the pulps, but only one really meant much to him: his first appearance in Black Mask under his real name that September with a story featuring series character Bob Larkin, who fought crime armed only with his ready wit and a pool cue. The following year, for Black Mask, Gardner created Ed Jenkins, the "Phantom Crook," who operated between the law and the underworld and was hunted by both. Jenkins became the author's longest-running series character, starring in a total of seventy-four adventures. Two other long-running series characters made their debut that year: western rider Black Barr, "Fate's Gunslinger," and the improbable Speed Dash, dubbed the "Human Fly" for his ability to scale tall office buildings.

Gardner's sales at Black Mask were by then a steady source of income. He had become one of the magazine's most popular contributors and had made a good friend of Phil Cody. It was Cody who convinced him that he needed an agent and lined him up with Robert Hardy in New York. Gardner told Hardy: "I've never been mediocre in anything I've done yet, and I want to either go to the top in the fiction game or quit it altogether (Hughes, p. 88)."

Indeed, with Hardy opening several new ,pulp markets for him in 1926, Gardner notched an amazing twelve-month total of ninety-seven sales, including twenty-six to Black Mask alone. His fiction was, however, still wildly melodramatic, as reflected in the overtly flamboyant series characters he created for the pulps: Lester Leith, the "Gentleman Rogue," Sidney Zoom, "Master of Disguise" (with his police dog, Rip); Soo Hoo Duck, "King of Chinatown," Dan Seller, the "Patent Leather Kid," Seņor Arnaz de Lobo, "Soldier of Fortune," Paul Pry, the "Crime Juggler," J. Keen, "Alibi Fixer,"; Dane Skarle, the "Gamy Crimefighter,"  El Paisano, the "Roadrunner," Ben Harper, the "Man Who Couldn't Forget,"  and Ed Migrane, the "Headache."

And, along the way, came the Old Walrus, Fish Mouth McGinnis, Hard Rock Hogan, and Go Get Em Garver and his detective duo, Jax Bowman and Big Jim Grood, billed as the "Avenging White Rings" (from the black masks they wore with white rings circling the eyes). Gardner's "Man in the Silver Mask" reflected period melodrama at its most lurid, and the author's description is darkly menacing:

There was a suggestion of grim, sinister firmness about the mouth, a suggestion which was heightened by the firm chin The eyes were a peculiar slate gray. The upper part of the face was concealed by a mask of metallic silver, modeled to conform to the contours of the nose, but not entirely concealing the cheek bones and the lower forehead. From behind the mask, the gray eyes seemed to take on the metallic glint of the silver. (Goulart, pp. 180-181)

The pulp historian Ron Goulart elaborates on Gardner's mysterious protagonist:

Aided by a seemingly sinister Oriental named Ah Wong, the Masked Man was headquartered in a secret hideaway and was fond of kidnaping gangsters and threatening to torture them. His war against crime was basically psychological and he and the deaf-and- dumb Chinese never actually followed through on their threats. Sometimes merely a look at the Masked Man was enough to scare the average crook into talking. (p. 180)

These unsuhtle, larger-than-life characters were featured in more than forty different pulps, from Fighting Romances through Clues, Gang World, Air Adventures, Rapid Fire Detective, Three-Star Western, Ace High, Top Notch, and a host of others equally lurid. Recalled Gardner: "It's a wonder I didn't kill myself with overwork. If I finished one story by twelve-thirty... I couldn't go to bed without starting another (Hughes, p. 83)." 

To Page Number Five