William R. Eyster
BiographyWilliam Reynolds Eyster (October 14, 1841–July 16, 1918), who also published under the pen name “R. Hunt Wilby,” was born in Johnstown, New York, of the Reverend David Eyster and his wife, Rebecca Mary Reynolds. He received his preliminary education in the common schools and later, when his parents removed to Pennsylvania, in the Seminary at Allentown. He entered Pennsylvania College at Gettysburg as a freshman in the second semester of 1856, was graduated at the age of 18 with the degree of A.B. in 1859, and two years later received his Master’s degree for his literary work. He taught from 1859 to 1868, including five years as Professor of Latin and Mathematics in the Gettysburg Female Institute. During the Civil War, from July to December, 1864, he served as first sergeant in Fullweiler’s Independent Cavalry Volunteers. In 1865 he took up the study of law and was admitted to the bar of that state on March 25, 1869. That same year he removed to Kansas and homesteaded, farming until 1894, while also practicing law in that state.
He was married in Washington, D. C., December 19, 1871, to Sarah Elizabeth Copeland, of Maryland. They had at least five children.
He had been writing fiction since 1858, beginning while yet a student. His first short story was published about 1858 in the Great Republic Monthly. He was one of the early authors of Beadle’s Dime Novels. Finallly realizing that literature paid, he decided to devote his whole time to writing. He appeared quite regularly thereafter as a contributor to the Beadle publications (as long as the firm bought manuscripts, that is until 1897) and also wrote for The Nickel Library. He was, for a time, editorial writer for the New York Sentry and other papers in Pennsylvania and Maryland. Said C. F. Scott in an article on “Kansas Literature,” “As a writer of everything, there is probably no one in the state better able to claim the title than Wm. R. Eyster.”
Bibliography (wildly incomplete)
Cedar Swamp; or, Wild Nat’s Brigade (1860)
Free Trappers’ Pass (1864)
The Haunted Hunter (1871)
Pistol Pards (1881)
Dandy Darke (1881)
Faro Frank of High Pine (1881)
Other links
Northern Illinois University Libraries