Edwin L. Sabin

Who was Edwin L. Sabin?

Edwin Legrand Sabin was an American author, primarily of boys' adventure stories, mostly set in the American West.

Sabin was born in Rockford, Illinois to Henry Sabin and Esther Frances Hotchkiss Sabin, but grew up in Clinton, Iowa, where his father became superintendent of schools when Sabin was less than a year old. Sabin's brother was the author Elbridge Hosmer Sabin. Sabin graduated from Clinton High School in 1888. He attended the University of Iowa until his senior year in 1892, when he left to begin his career as a newspaper reporter. He returned to graduate with Phi Beta Kappa honors in 1900. At the University of Iowa he was a member of Beta Theta Pi and the school's first rugby team.

Sabin worked for a number of newspapers in Iowa and Illinois: the Daily Herald in Clinton, the Des Moines Daily News, the Daily State Register, and the Daily Capital in Des Moines, Iowa, the Morning Democrat in Davenport, Iowa, the Peoria Herald, the Peoria Transcript, and the Peoria Journal in Peoria, Illinois, and Campbell's Weekly in Chicago, Illinois.