Walter R. Brooks
| Walter R. Brooks | |
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| Born | Walter Rollin Brooks January 9, 1886 Rome, New York, USA |
| Died | August 17, 1958 (aged 72) Roxbury, New York |
| Occupation | Writer |
| Genre | Short stories, children's novels |
Walter Rollin Brooks (January 9, 1886 – August 17, 1958) was an American writer best remembered for his short stories on Mister Ed the talking horse and children's books, particularly those about Freddy the Pig and other anthropomorphic animal inhabitants of the "Bean farm" in upstate New York.
Brooks was born in Rome, New York. He attended college at the University of Rochester and subsequently studied homeopathic medicine in New York City. He dropped out after two years, however, and returned to Rochester where he married his first wife Anne Shepard in 1909. Brooks found employment with an advertising agency in Utica, and then "retired" in 1911, evidently because he came into a considerable inheritance. His retirement was not permanent; in 1917, he went to work for the American Red Cross and he later did editorial work for several magazines, including "a nonfiction stint with The New Yorker 1932–1933". In 1940, Brooks turned to his own writing for his full-time occupation. Walter married his second wife Dorothy Collins following the death of Anne in 1952.
The first works that Brooks published were poems and short stories. Among the latter were a series (from 1937) of short stories featuring "a talking horse and his drunken owner"; it was the basis for a 1960s television comedy series Mister Ed. (Credit is given in each episode to "Walter Brooks" for creating the characters. Brooks himself had died by the time that production began on the show; as of early November 2013, it was not known whether his estate collected royalties from its production.) His most enduring works, however, are the 26 books that he wrote about Freddy the Pig and his friends. Boucher and McComas, for example, praised Freddy and the Spaceship, saying that it "offers wit, sound structural plotting, genuine character-humor, and admirable English prose".
In 2009, Overlook Press published a biography on the life and work of Walter R. Brooks entitled Talking Animals and Others: The Life and Work of Walter R. Brooks, Creator of Freddy the Pig by Michael Cart, .
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