Patten, Gilbert

Patten, Gilbert (b. George William Patten) (Burt L. Standish, William West Wilder, among many pen names) (1866–1945) writer; born in Corinna, Maine. He ran away when he was 16, worked in a machine shop, and attended Corinna Union Academy. He began selling dime novels, moved to New York City (1891), and wrote Westerns. From 1896 to 1913 he wrote his Frank Merriwell series for Tip Top Weekly under the pen name of Burt L. Standish. Frank Merriwell became a popular paradigm of youth, virtue, wealth, education, good looks, and athletic ability, a mythological American juvenile hero who had little in common with his creator or readers. Patten lived in New York City and Camden, Maine, until he moved to California in 1941.