Editing Edgar Rice Burroughs (section)

==Biography==
===Early life and family===
Burroughs was born on September 1, 1875, in [[Chicago]], [[Illinois]],{{efn|He later lived for many years in the Chicago suburb [[Oak Park, Illinois|Oak Park]].}} the fourth son of Major George Tyler Burroughs, a businessman and [[American Civil War|Civil War]] veteran, and his wife, Mary Evaline (Zieger) Burroughs. Edgar's middle name is from his paternal grandmother, Mary Coleman Rice Burroughs.<ref>{{cite book | year = 2010 | title = Descendants of Edmund Rice: The First Nine Generations | edition= CD}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url= http://www.edmund-rice.org/era5gens/ |title= Edmund Rice Six-Generation Database Online |publisher= [[Edmund Rice (1638)]] Association |access-date= January 27, 2011 |archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20110725005839/http://www.edmund-rice.org/era5gens/ |archive-date= July 25, 2011 |url-status= dead }}</ref><ref name= "Schneider 2004 296">{{cite book | last = Schneider | first = Jerry L | year = 2004 | title = The Ancestry of Edgar Rice Burroughs | publisher = Erbville Press | isbn = 978-1-4357-4972-6 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=ZcBg6irPpVcC | format = Google Books |page= 296}}</ref>

Burroughs was of English and [[Pennsylvania Dutch]] ancestry, with a family line that had been in North America since the [[colonialist|Colonial]] era.<ref>{{cite web |url= http://globalfirstsandfacts.com/2017/08/16/edgar-rice-burroughs/|title=Edgar Rice Burroughs|date=August 16, 2017|access-date=March 12, 2018|archive-date=March 12, 2018 |website= globalfirstsandfacts.com |archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20180312083449/http://globalfirstsandfacts.com/2017/08/16/edgar-rice-burroughs/|url-status=usurped}}</ref><ref name=":0" /> Through his Rice grandmother, Burroughs was descended from [[settler]] [[Edmund Rice (colonist)|Edmund Rice]], one of the English [[Puritan]]s who moved to [[Massachusetts Bay Colony]] in the early 17th century. He once remarked: "I can trace my ancestry back to [[Deacon]] Edmund Rice."<ref>{{Cite book |last=Burroughs |first=Edgar Rice |url=https://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks03/0300191h.html |title=Escape on Venus |publisher=Edgar Rice Burroughs, Inc. |year=1946 |language=English |chapter=Chapter 6 |archive-date=March 17, 2025 |access-date=January 20, 2025 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20250317133114/http://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks03/0300191h.html |url-status=live }}</ref> The Burroughs side of the family was also of English origin, having emigrated to Massachusetts around the same time. Many of his ancestors fought in the [[American Revolutionary War|American Revolution]]. Some of his ancestors settled in Virginia during the colonial period, and Burroughs often emphasized his connection with that side of his family, seeing it as romantic and warlike.<ref name="Schneider 2004 296"/><ref name=":0">Taliaferro, John. ''Tarzan Forever: The Life of Edgar Rice Burroughs, Creator of Tarzan''. pp. 15, 27.</ref>

Burroughs was educated at a number of local schools then at  [[Phillips Academy]] in [[Andover, Massachusetts]], and then the [[Michigan Military Academy]]. He graduated in 1895, but he failed the entrance exam for the [[United States Military Academy]] at West Point, so instead he enlisted with the [[7th U.S. Cavalry]] in [[Fort Grant, Arizona|Fort Grant]], [[Arizona Territory]]. However, he was diagnosed with a heart problem and thus ineligible to serve, so he was discharged in 1897.<ref name = "slotkin">{{Cite book | last = Slotkin | first = Richard | author-link = Richard Slotkin | title = Gunfighter Nation | publisher = University of Oklahoma Press | page = 196 | isbn = 0-8061-3031-8| year = 1998}}</ref>

[[File:Bookplate of Edgar Rice Burroughs.jpg|thumb|Burroughs's [[bookplate]], showing Tarzan holding the planet Mars, surrounded by other characters from his stories and symbols relating to his personal interests and career.]]
[[File:Letter from Edgar Rice Burroughs to Ruthven Deane 1922.jpg|thumb|Typescript letter, with Tarzana Ranch letterhead, from Burroughs to [[Ruthven Deane]], explaining the design and significance of his [[bookplate]]]]
After his discharge, Burroughs worked at a number of different jobs. During the Chicago [[influenza]] epidemic of 1891, he spent half a year at his brother's ranch on the [[Raft River]] in [[Idaho]] as a [[cowboy]]. He drifted afterward, then worked at his father's Chicago battery factory in 1899. He married his childhood sweetheart, Emma Hulbert (1876–1944), in January 1900.<ref>{{Cite web |title=ERB Biography < Edgar Rice Burroughs |url=https://www.edgarriceburroughs.com/erb-biography/ |access-date=2025-03-09 |website=Edgar Rice Burroughs |language=en-US}}</ref>

In 1903, Burroughs joined his brothers, [[Yale]] graduates George and Harry, who were, by then, prominent Pocatello area ranchers in southern Idaho, and partners in the Sweetser-Burroughs Mining Company, where he took on managing their ill-fated [[Snake River]] [[gold dredge]], a classic bucket-line dredge. The Burroughs brothers were also the sixth cousins, once removed, of famed miner [[Kate Rice]] who, in 1914, became the first female prospector in the Canadian North. Journalist and publisher [[C. Allen Thorndike Rice]] was also his third cousin.<ref>{{cite web| url= http://edmund-rice.org/library/ERA_Entertainers.pdf | last= Rice | first= Michael A.| archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20150924095805/http://edmund-rice.org/library/ERA_Entertainers.pdf | archive-date=September 24, 2015 | publisher= Edmund Rice (1638) Association, Inc.| title= Meet Some of Edmund Rice's Descendants: Notable Writers & Entertainers| page= 11| access-date= October 11, 2017}}</ref>

When the new mine proved unsuccessful, the brothers secured for Burroughs a position with the [[Oregon Short Line Railroad]] in Salt Lake City.<ref>{{cite web | url= https://offbeatoregon.com/1503b.edgar-rice-burroughs-in-oregon.html| last= John| first= Finn |archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20170804205616/http://offbeatoregon.com/1503b.edgar-rice-burroughs-in-oregon.html |archive-date=August 4, 2017 | website= Offbeat Oregon| title= Ill-starred gold-mining venture worked out well for Tarzan fans| date= March 8, 2015 | access-date= October 11, 2017}}</ref> Burroughs resigned from the railroad in October 1904.{{Sfn | Holtsmark | 1986 | pp = [https://archive.org/details/edgarriceburroug0000holt <!-- quote="Idaho and his father in Chicago". --> 3]–[https://archive.org/details/edgarriceburroug0000holt <!-- quote=Emma. --> 4]}}

===Later life===
By 1911, around age 36, after seven years of low wages as a pencil-sharpener wholesaler, Burroughs began to write fiction. By this time, Emma and he had two children, Joan (1908–1972), and Hulbert (1909–1991).{{Sfn | Holtsmark | 1986 | p = 5}} During this period, he had copious spare time and began reading [[pulp magazine|pulp-fiction magazines]]. In 1929, he recalled thinking that:

{{quote | "[...] if people were paid for writing rot such as I read in some of those magazines, that I could write stories just as rotten. As a matter of fact, although I had never written a story, I knew absolutely that I could write stories just as entertaining and probably a whole lot more so than any I chanced to read in those magazines."<ref>{{cite web |first=Edgar Rice |last=Burroughs |date=1929-10-27 |url=http://www.erbzine.com/mag0/0052.html |title=How I Wrote the Tarzan Stories |work=[[The Washington Post|Washington Post]], [[New York World]] (Sunday supplement) |publisher=ERBZine.com |access-date=September 4, 2010 |archive-date=September 4, 2010 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100904031424/http://www.erbzine.com/mag0/0052.html |url-status=live }}</ref>}}

In 1913, Burroughs and Emma had their third and last child, [[John Coleman Burroughs]] (1913–1979), later known for his illustrations of his father's books.<ref>{{Cite news|title=Obituaries / Danton Burroughs, 1944–2008; Tarzan Creator's Heir Protected the Legacy.|last=Nelson|first=V. J.|date=May 15, 2008|work=Los Angeles Times|id={{ProQuest| }}}}</ref>

In the 1920s, Burroughs became a pilot, purchased a [[Security Airster S-1]], and encouraged his family to learn to fly.<ref>{{cite journal|journal=AOPA Pilot|date=May 2014|title=A Plane-Crazy America}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|title=Joan Burroughs|url=http://www.erbzine.com/mag11/1104.html|access-date=February 14, 2015|archive-date=August 3, 2015|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150803022233/http://www.erbzine.com/mag11/1104.html|url-status=live}}</ref>

Daughter Joan married ''Tarzan'' film actor [[James Pierce]]. She starred with her husband as the voice of ''Jane'', during 1932–1934 for the ''[[Tarzan (radio program)|Tarzan]]'' radio series.

Burroughs divorced Emma in 1934, and, in 1935, married the former actress [[Florence Gilbert]] Dearholt, who was the former wife of his friend (who was then himself remarrying), [[Ashton Dearholt]], with whom he had co-founded Burroughs-Tarzan Enterprises while filming ''The New Adventures of Tarzan''. Burroughs adopted the Dearholts' two children. He and Florence divorced in 1942.{{Sfn | Holtsmark | 1986 | pp = 12–13}}

Burroughs was in his late 60s and was in [[Honolulu]] at the time of the Japanese [[attack on Pearl Harbor]].<ref>{{cite book|title=The Rising Sun|url=https://archive.org/details/risingsundecline00tola|url-access=registration|last=Toland|first=John|date=1970|publisher=Random House|isbn=0-8129-6858-1|edition=2003 Modern Library Paperback|page=220}}<!--|access-date=September 23, 2015 --></ref> Despite his age, he applied for and received permission to become a [[war correspondent]], becoming one of the oldest U.S. war correspondents during [[World War II]]. This period of his life is mentioned in [[William Brinkley]]'s bestselling novel ''[[Don't Go Near the Water (novel)|Don't Go Near the Water]]''.<ref>{{Cite web |date=February 19, 2024 |title=Edgar Rice Burroughs {{!}} Biography, Books, & Facts {{!}} Britannica |url=https://www.britannica.com/biography/Edgar-Rice-Burroughs |access-date=March 1, 2024 |website=www.britannica.com |language=en |archive-date=June 24, 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190624183641/https://www.britannica.com/biography/Edgar-Rice-Burroughs |url-status=live }}</ref>

===Death===
After the war ended, Burroughs moved back to [[Encino, California]], where after many health problems, he died of a heart attack on March 19, 1950, having written almost 80 novels. He is buried in Tarzana, California, US.{{Sfn | Holtsmark | 1986 | pp = 13–15}}

At the time of his death he was believed to have been the writer who had made the most from films, earning over US$2&nbsp;million in royalties from 27 Tarzan pictures.<ref>{{cite news|url=https://archive.org/stream/variety177-1950-03#page/n198/mode/1up|title='Tarzan' Paid Off Big to Burroughs|page=7|work=[[Variety (magazine)|Variety]]|date=March 22, 1950|access-date=April 2, 2018}}</ref>

The [[EMP Museum#Science Fiction and Fantasy Hall of Fame|Science Fiction Hall of Fame]] inducted Burroughs in 2003.<ref name = SFAwards/><ref name=sfhof-old />