to see Pat Baker. During that time Jim had once again sat down to
another improvised desk, in newly-found quarters, and had begun two new
stories. He was not actually writing them now, but only making general
outlines which he carefully filed away for future use. Some of his work,
however, was awaiting completion and these Jim promptly finished and
mailed out to various magazine and newspaper publishers.
Jim’s meeting with Pat Baker was short and to the point. He was put on
the pay-roll and assigned to work forthwith.
George Snow, editor of the Sunday edition of the _News_, asked Jim to
write some “feature stuff” for him and Jim promptly complied. Snow
complained, however, that Jim’s plots had been written and rewritten a
thousand and one times. He wanted to give the readers something new,
something with a snap in it. This peeved Jim a great deal and for four
successive days he pouted and thought it over seriously. Then he came to
the conclusion that if George Snow and Pat Baker wanted something
different and unusual, they would most certainly get it.
Jim began wracking his brains for a story with an unusual angle and
twist to it. Eventually such a story came to him, and he began receiving
larger assignments from the Detroit _News-Tribune_.
From the very beginning of Jim’s newspaper career with the Detroit paper
he had had to start out on small items of interest in order to learn the
ropes. That procedure was as usual then as it is now on all newspapers
of major importance. Despite the fact that it was one of the customs
governing the publication of the _News-Tribune_, Jim Curwood disliked it
very much when he found that he had to cover funerals, fires and auto
accidents to start with. All of these were well handled and he received
due credit for them. But all the praise and glory Pat Baker could heap
upon his shoulders could not make Jim happy, for he was dissatisfied. He
even had to handle “obits” and state deaths in the very beginning, and
to a writer of any ability at all, this practically is an insult.
However, Jim took it like a man and kept his chin high and went on.
Coincident with handling his newspaper work, Jim was writing his own
stories and sending them out. He now was writing with the blood of a
true adventurer surging through his veins ... he was inspired.
Perhaps the most disheartening factor of all was that Jim’s salary on
the paper was only $8.00 a week. This was not nearly enough for two
people to live on.
Fortunately enough, George Snow frequently asked Jim for a feature story
for the Sunday edition. Payment for this, together with his regular
salary, helped immensely.
Pat Baker assigned Jim early one morning to accompany Stewart, another
reporter, into Canada, just across the river from Detroit, and cover a
“hanging.” Jim went and covered the execution, but nearly fainted when
the trap was sprung on the gallows. “To add insult to injury,” Baker
then only used twenty lines of what Jim had written. All this led Jim
Curwood to believe that he was not worth eight cents a week, let alone
$8.00, as a reporter. But he finally got over the shock of the execution
and the fact that only twenty lines of all he had written had been used,
and went back to the steady grind.
Jim’s “big chance” finally came. He was ordered to watch police
headquarters for “something big.” Here he would have an opportunity for
a “scoop.” For days upon end he practically haunted the Detroit Police
Headquarters. True enough, there were many stories that could have been
written about the various arrests and charges, but that was not what Jim
was looking for. He wanted something big. After several days had elapsed
it came. When the story broke, he thought it had amazing possibilities,
so he immediately wrote it up and shot it into the office. The entire
staff handled it as if it was almost “too hot to handle.” George Snow,
Pat Baker and all the so-called “big shots” patted the young reporter on
the back and told him that he was really one of them now, that it was a
job well done. Baker even went so far as to grant the raise in salary
that Jim had so thoughtfully asked for. Jim now felt as if he were
firmly established with the Detroit _News-Tribune_ and he was indeed
proud and happy. He was highly elated at his future possibilities and
was feeling very confident of himself now. He was handling “Big Time”
news. He was a real reporter of the first school.
The next morning, however, the “payoff” came. When Jim arrived at the
office he discovered that there was a most unusual conference going on
in Baker’s office. It was a conference of editors. Several minutes after
Jim had sat down to his desk, the men in Baker’s office filed out and as
they did so they all looked straight at Jim. Why were they all looking
so hard at him, was the thought that entered his excited mind.
It seemed that everyone in the office was down on him, and to save his
soul he could not figure out just why. All those stares were bothering
Jim and interfering with his work. Upon asking for an explanation he
discovered that he had not heard the culprit’s name correctly and it
appeared in the newspaper as if one of Detroit’s most highly respected
citizens had been “horsewhipped.” This, Jim slowly began to realize, was
the beginning of the end for him and his newspaper career. He had made a
mistake and he would have to pay for it.
That day Jim Curwood was fired from his job and all his back pay was
withheld from him. It was all due to the fact that he had not checked a
name in the city directory and thus it had appeared that one of
Detroit’s most illustrious citizens had been the object of a common
“horsewhipping.” It was the end of his short but eventful career with
the _News-Tribune_. It was then that Jim Curwood found out just how hard
it was to find work in Detroit in those days. Being undaunted, however,
Jim kept right on with his writing and was determined that despite the
losing of his job he wasn’t whipped yet. Unfortunately, Jim was able to
sell very few of his stories and very soon both he and his wife began to
look underfed and their clothing began to appear rather shabby.
At long last the struggling young author received another break of good
fortune. He chanced upon Alfred Russell, then one of Michigan’s greatest
lawyers, who promptly offered him a job with a pharmaceutical company.
It was named the Parke-Davis Company and was located on Jefferson
Avenue. Jim’s salary to begin with would be $50.00 per month and a
chance for a raise if he worked hard enough and showed enough
improvement. So Jim Curwood turned to making “pills.”
It was indeed most fortunate that the young man knew that this was not
his type of work and he grew discontented with it on each passing day.
Nevertheless, he had a wife to support and to make a living for the both
of them. So he was making pills. He wanted to write, but this moulding
of so-called medicine was constantly interfering.
It seemed to Jim that all his plans, his hopes and his aspirations, all
his fondest dreams and optimistic outlooks on life had all come to an
abrupt end. Would he have to go through life as a “pillmaker,” was a
constant query in his active and alert mind. He shuddered at the
thought.
One day, as he was hard at work, a fellow employee told Jim that there
was a man living very near the company who claimed to be a baron, a man
whose ancestry dated back several hundred years in the old country. Jim
later found out that this man was actually working right there in the
factory, as a common laborer. In those days it was great news to find
one of noble heritage, let alone one who worked at common labor. So, Jim
promptly made it a point to see and talk to the man, gain his well
wishes and get his permission to have a story concerning him published.
Jim carefully gathered the material he needed and at once wrote it up
and mailed it to the Detroit _News-Tribune_.
Being quite capable of seeing far enough in front of their noses, the
editors of the paper not only bought the story but put Jim back on the
payroll. This time, however, it was on a much more important job, for
Jim was made a special writer on the Sunday edition of the
_News-Tribune_ at a salary of $18.00 every week.
Besides the promotion, Jim now had his own private office, tastefully
furnished, on the second floor of the older section of the building. Jim
plunged joyfully into his new assignments. This was not a job for him;
it was a labor of love.
In a comparatively short time Jim was turning out one and two-page
features that were promptly published. He was now working seven days
each week and many times he even worked late into the night.
Time was passing rather rapidly for Jim now and inside of two years
after returning to the _News-Tribune_, his salary had been increased to
$25.00. It was during this time that the first of Jim’s two daughters
was born and there was not to be found a happier man on the face of the
earth than James Oliver Curwood. He had a fine wife, he loved the work
which he was doing, and he actually possessed a wonderful baby daughter
named Carlotta.
Many things were now entering into Jim Curwood’s life and his writing
output was also bothering him considerably. He was striving to do more
than he had been doing in the past, but just how he was going to go
about this he did not know. His time was more than just rationed and he
had to use it sparingly.
Jim at last decided that he would do away with all of his
pleasure-filled hours and devote what time he could at the office as
well as those out of the office to purely creative work and nothing
else. He would, furthermore, branch out farther and with more scope than
he had ever imagined. So he began a series of slick-paper magazine
stories and immediately sold the first one, “The Captain of the
Christopher Duggan,” to the _Munsey_ magazine. He was paid $75.00 for
this story, the most he had ever received for any story before. Jim
Curwood now thought seriously of quitting his newspaper work and
devoting himself exclusively to his literary efforts. But when the
_News-Tribune_ raised his salary to $28.00, he decided to forego his
dreams until a more propitious time. This decision probably saved the
genius of James Oliver Curwood from certain disaster. For as yet he was
not fully prepared to enter the great field of literature entirely upon
his own, even though he did not realize it then.
At the _News-Tribune_ Jim was under the constant tutelage of Annesley
Burrowes, who saw to it that the young writer’s burning spark was never
extinguished and that his imagination was always afire with creative
efforts. Burrowes believed strongly in young James Curwood’s chances of
rising to truly great heights in the field of newspaper writing and in
the fictional world. Time has shown that Mr. Burrowes’ intuition was
correct and accurate.
Shortly after Jim received his raise in salary, Mr. Burrowes resigned
his post at the _News-Tribune_, due to an eye ailment, and with his
going Jim took his place. He now was getting $30.
“I am sure that I only partly filled the position.”
This remark Jim Curwood made in his own modest manner.
Through the years beginning with 1902 up to and including 1905 the
rapidly rising young author published quite a number of articles and
short stories, among which were: “Pills,” which ran in _Frank Leslie’s
Popular Monthly_; another _Munsey_ story, and Jim’s first juvenile
serial was published in _The American Boy_. In 1905 Jim vacationed in
the wilds, whereby he obtained the basis for a number of articles which
appeared in _Outing_, _Outlook_, _Woman’s Home Companion_,
_Cosmopolitan_, and others. It was also during this hectic period that
Jim edited a banker’s publication which was called “_Dollars and
Sense_.”
With the appearance of these numerous articles and fiction works, Hewitt
Hanson Howland, editor of a magazine published by Bobbs-Merrill in
Indianapolis, began to take notice of the rising writer’s works and
asked him to do a series of articles on the Great Lakes for his
magazine. Jim also was contributing nature sketches to _Leslie’s
Weekly_. Of this group he published more than one hundred articles.
Having now been on the staff of special writers of the _News-Tribune_
for three years, Jim Curwood was really beginning to feel like a veteran
“news-hawk.” It was in his third year as a special writer that Jim’s
wife presented him with his second daughter, who was named Viola. Now he
was the father of two fine girls. Jim was gloriously happy, of that
there was little doubt, but for some apparently unknown reason, his wife
was not. Perhaps it was because he had excluded her from his real life.
With the birth of her second child Mrs. Curwood began to seem rather
discontented and nervous. In fact she seemed dissatisfied with her life
with Jim Curwood altogether. Why, Jim was never able fully to find out,
except for the fact that the life of a writer was too confining for her.
Had she stopped to realize that her husband was on his way to the top of
the ladder and would eventually reach that goal, the marriage might have
lasted.
Following his successful contacts with _Munsey’s_ and other famous
magazines, Jim was made one of the “bigshots” of the Detroit paper and
served in that capacity until 1907. He had been writing continuously for
fourteen years, sticking everlastingly to his chosen profession. He
deserved success much more than the average writers of the time.
As fast as the so-called “big breaks” would come to Jim Curwood, he
would turn out better articles and stories than ever before. With each
successive sale it seemed certain that his writing actually was of a
high order. Evidently scores of various publications thought as much,
for Jim was receiving requests for his stories from papers and magazines
throughout the United States and Canada. His work was in great demand at
this time as it so continued to be for many years to pass.
In 1906 Jim Curwood began writing two novels. This was his very first
attempt at book length work and though somewhat hesitant at first, Jim
fought his way through valiantly. The first was entitled “The Wolf
Hunters,” a tale of the Hudson Bay country, and the second one was “The
Courage of Captain Plum.” The latter was an adventurous yarn of the
Mormon settlements on Beaver Island in Lake Michigan.
Late in 1907, the year of Jim’s 29th birthday, he completed both “The
Wolf Hunters” and “The Courage of Captain Plum,” and sent them both off
to the Bobbs-Merrill Company in Indianapolis. Many anxious weeks passed
during which time Jim waited with prayerful hopes as he continued his
newspaper work. Then one day a letter came with the wonderful news that
both his manuscripts had been accepted for publication, and that “The
Courage of Captain Plum” was so well liked that he was being offered a
contract for one book yearly for the next five years. Jim’s books were
to sell for one dollar and a half of which he was to receive a ten per
cent royalty. To say that the young man was jubilant and happy would be
putting it mildly. Jim very nearly tore up the city room of the Detroit
_News-Tribune_ when he had read the letter from the Indianapolis
publishers. Both books were published in 1908.
Now more than ever Jim Curwood realized how swell Pat Baker, George Snow
and Annesley Burrowes, as well as the entire staff of the paper, had
been to him in affording him the great opportunities that he had had.
What they did for him were enshrined as memories deep within his tender,
loving heart. For they had provided the chance for Jim to get his name
before the reading public and thus enabled his works to be read.
Within a few days after receiving the notice that his two book-length
manuscripts had been accepted, James Oliver Curwood handed in his
resignation to the Detroit _News-Tribune_ as assistant editor, and began
to plan and devote his life wholly to literary work. Thus, the
_News-Tribune_ lost one of its finest writers. Jim was a natural born
newspaperman and with his resignation the paper suffered a great loss.
Upon his leaving the Detroit paper, Jim wrote to his brother Ed, who
still was in Ohio and invited him on a long vacation trip into the
wilderness. Ed accepted and the two brothers enjoyed one of the grandest
adventures of their lives in the country surrounding Hudson’s Bay.
CHAPTER EIGHT
GOD’S COUNTRY
With the acceptance of his first two novels in 1907 Jim Curwood
definitely proved that he knew what he was doing and that he was on the
right road to success. Even then, as the young author received official
word of the forthcoming publication of his first two works, he was
drafting plans for the writing of three other pieces of fiction work.
These were only the forerunners of many others which followed and which
established James Oliver Curwood as one of the foremost authorities on
the Canadian Northwest.
Jim’s first book, “The Wolf Hunters,” was somewhat of a juvenile story
centering about the Hudson Bay wilds. Although starting it had been
rather hard for him, Jim soon developed it into an easy task, and so,
fired with still greater ambition, he wrote a second novel, “The Courage
of Captain Plum.”
Writing book-length novels was new to Jim, but it was work which was
both interesting and good. He was always out of bed by five in the
morning and by six o’clock he could be found fast at work. Jim would
write steadily until noon and many times long past noon. There were many
occasions when his wife would have to call him several times before he
would leave his desk, so engrossed was he in his writing.
For over a year he pounded his typewriter. He never rewrote any of his
work, believing that once a story was written it could never be
rewritten quite so good. Of course, he did take time to correct his
grammar and punctuation, but that was as far as he went.
It was during this period of incessant writing that Jim’s home life
began to suffer a severe blow, for he had been neglecting his family.
Jim began to notice a great change in his wife.
Yet, while he felt that something was wrong in his household, it never
dawned upon him that not only was he driving himself to the limit, but
he also was driving his wife’s patience to the very end. For it was very
little that she saw of him, and even when she was with him, it seemed as
if his mind was always on the waiting typewriter and paper, and not upon
her or their children. In two years the great blow fell. Early in 1908
the inevitable result came ... divorce.
Some time after the divorce had been granted, Jim remarked:
“As we grow older we all learn that it is better to let the dead past
bury its dead in peace.”
After the acceptance and publication of his first two book-length novels
by the Bobbs-Merrill Company Jim began the long drive for publicity that
is so vitally important to an author. Realizing that in order to become
famous he must get his name before the reading public, Jim induced more
than one newspaper to print his success story. Perhaps the best one was
that which appeared in the Detroit _News-Tribune_. Even the _Argus_,
back in Owosso, gave him a great write-up, and Jim Curwood at last knew
that he was really on his way to a colorful and glorious career.
Slowly but surely the little city of Owosso began to claim James Oliver
Curwood as its own native son. In fact, the writer’s name was upon every
tongue. Even those who at one time had felt that they were much too good
to speak to Jim Curwood, now regarded him as a close friend. Even those
who had never seen him boasted of having grown up together. Such talk as
this was going on in and around Owosso and in other parts of the state.
All were eager to make claim upon one whom they had once shunned and
laughed at.
At long last Jim decided that he wanted and needed a vacation very
badly, so he wired his brother Ed, down in Ohio, to come up and join him
for a trip into the wilds.
Jim lost no time in getting ready, and soon the two brothers started on
their long trek into the wilds of northern Canada. Traveling aboard the
Grand Trunk railways, they received free transportation because Jim was
well known by officials and was well liked.
The trip was to be a long one. They were headed for the Athabaska
Landing territory and possibly farther up to the edge of the Great Slave
country that abounds with all sorts of North American wildlife, which
for the most part, roam about at will.
Jim and Ed took to canoes many times, thoroughly enjoying their fight in
the roaring rapids of the swift, turbulent northern streams.
On their walks in the forests Jim stopped many times to listen to the
sounds of wildlife all about them. High above in the towering pine trees
came the ever welcomed songs of the birds. Over on a ridge could be
heard the calls of foxes. Somewhere in the heart of the forests came the
sounds of mink, the hoot of owls, and the roar of the grizzly bear.
[Illustration: _J.C. WEBER_]
Along the banks of the roaring stream, the Marten, the mink and the
weasel could be heard as they slipped down to the water’s edge for a
drink of cooling water. All of these sounds and noises of the twilight
and early nightfall James Oliver Curwood studied and loved. He loved
nature and wildlife with a savage love, and hated those who dared to
disrupt their silent, peaceful and happy abodes.
Jim Curwood fought for those animals throughout all his life and was
even waging a valiant battle for them up until the time he died. Ed
marvelled at his younger brother’s devotion for wildlife, and he, too,
grew to love the wilderness and all it stood for with an undying love
during the first trip of theirs together into “God’s Country.”
For three months the two brothers stayed away from civilization, taking
in all the wonders of nature. Jim took countless photographs of wildlife
during this trip, and these, together with others he took over a period
of years he made into one of the largest and finest collections of its
kind in the world.
With the publication of Jim’s first two books and the release of
numerous articles and short stories in various magazines, all of which
were based upon settings in Canada, the Canadian Government offered the
now somewhat famous James Oliver Curwood the sum of $1800.00 a year with
all his expenses if he would explore the distant wilds of the Dominion
and use all he saw as a basis for material in his future writings.
This plan was primarily to induce tourists and vacationists into the
picturesque provinces. It also was to be used in an effort to bring
settlers into the wilderness to cultivate the soil and provide the
citizens of the Dominion with an abundance of wheat and other fine
crops. Jim was to write all he saw and was interested in for publication
in any form he chose. Jim accepted the offer almost immediately. It was
toward the latter part of 1908.
An exploration trip such as this had long been somewhat of a
“far-fetched dream” of Jim’s, and now at last that dream was becoming a
reality.
Plans were soon under way and he began conferring with government
officials. The Canadian officials complied with Jim’s every request and
within four short and eventful weeks, Jim Curwood was completely ready
for his long journey into the wilderness.
Back in 1902, while employed at the _News-Tribune_ in Detroit, Jim had
become acquainted with M. V. MacInness. MacInness was then representing
the Canadian Immigration Department in Detroit whose offices were
located on Jefferson Avenue. He was affectionately known to all who knew
him as just “Mac,” and Jim was one of his very best friends.
“He was rather portly and always in jovial humor. He never tired of
painting vivid word pictures for me of his beloved Canada, more
particularly the vast panorama of unexplored wilderness toward the north
and west. His mind was filled with information concerning that
magnificent expanse of territory and he never lost an opportunity to
introduce me to important Canadians who came to his office. I met many
Dominion immigration officials, members of Parliament, Hudson Bay
Company officials, officers of the Grand Trunk and Canadian Pacific,
members of the Royal Northwest Mounted Police, and scores of others
whose interests were in the vast areas of the Canadian Northland.”
[Illustration: _J.C. WEBER_]