Name Charles Burton | ||
Charles Pierce Burton, (1862-1949) was a newspaper columnist and author of the "Bob's Hill" young adult books.
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Biographical details
Burton was born in Anderson, Indiana, in Madison County. His father worked for a newspaper and met his mother when she wrote columns for the paper as a student. As a child, Burton moved to Massachusetts, where he hiked around a ridge called Bob's Hill. This ridge would be the setting of most of Burton's later books. After the death of his mother, Burton and his father eventually moved to Aurora, Illinois. Burton attended East Aurora High School, where he graduated in 1880.
Burton began writing books after hearing an editor mention that he was looking for a series of boys' books. Burton set his books in a fictionalized version of Adams, Massachusetts. The Bob's Hill series eventually covered 12 books, whose characters traveled to many parts of the world.
Burton worked as the editor of Earth Mover magazine and wrote a history column for The Aurora Beacon-News. The columns were later collected into a book of historical stories about Aurora. Burton also published a collection of light essays entitled, "The Bashful Man and Others".