Randall Parrish

George Randall Parrish (June 10, 1858 – August 9, 1923) was an American lawyer, journalist, and writer - in particular, author of dime novels, including Wolves of the Sea (Being a Tale of the Colonies from the Manuscript of One Geoffry Carlyle, Seaman, Narrating Certain Strange Adventures Which Befell Him Aboard the Pirate Craft "Namur").

Early life Parrish was born on June 10, 1858, in the city of Kewanee, Illinois, as the only son of Rufus Parker and Frances Adeline (Hollis) Parrish. He was born in "Rose Cottage", at what was later the site of the city's Methodist Episcopal church. The old family home was at Gilmanton, New Hampshire, but Parrish' parents removed to Kewanee from Boston, where Rufus Parker Parrish had been engaged in business and was prominently associated with William Lloyd Garrison and others in the anti-slavery cause. Both parents had a wide acquaintance with multiple well-known citizens of Boston of that era, including Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr., John Greenleaf Whittier, Wendell Phillips, and Ralph Waldo Emerson.

The Parrish came to Kewanee in April 1855; the husband forming connections with the pioneer store of Morse & Willard, then situated at the corner of Main and Fourth streets. A little later the firm became Parrish & Faulkner, the business finally being sold to Elias Lyman, being thus the nucleus for the department store of Lyman-Lay Company. From the time of arrival until his death in 1903, Rufus Parrish was ranked among the most prominent citizens of the community in which he conducted a bookstore and held many offices of trust. St John's Episcopal church was established and maintained largely through his efforts, and for twenty-five years, he was president of the public library board.

Younger Parrish was educated in the Kewanee public schools, graduating from the old academy building in the second class, that of 1875. In addition, he attended Allen's Academy at Lake Forest, Illinois, and Griswold College, Davenport, Iowa. Deciding upon law as a profession, he took one year at the Union College of Law, Chicago, completing his course at the Iowa State University, where he won the state bar prize for the best essay on a legal topic. He was admitted before the supreme court of Iowa in May 1879, but his certificate was withheld until he became of age. Parrish then went to Wichita, Kansas, and became an assistant in the law office of William C. Little, a year later forming a partnership with E. S. Martin, a one-time principal of the Kewanee high school. Devoting a lot of his time to politics and having achieved a reputation as a public speaker, he was elected city attorney alongside being a delegate to county and state conventions.

Going west His health starting to break down from close confinement, Parrish crossed the plains in 1882 with a cattle party, walking most of the way to Las Vegas, New Mexico. Arriving there, he discovered conditions had arisen in Wichita that left him without money, compelling him to labor at anything he could. During the following few months, he worked at tracklaying, engine wiping, and firing between Las Vegas and Albuquerque on the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe Railroad, finally going as a sheep driver to Fort Sumner. He was camped on the outskirts of there when Billy the Kid was killed by the sheriff of Lincoln County and saw the desperado both before and after death.

Other works

Keith of the Border: A Tale of the Plains (1910) My Lady of Doubt (1911) Love under Fire (1911) Molly McDonald (1912) Gordon Craig, Soldier of Fortune (1912) The Red Mist: A Tale of Civil Strife (1914) Beyond the Frontier: A Romance of Early Days in the Middle West (1915) The Devil's Own: A Romance of the Black Hawk War (1917) The Strange Case of Cavendish (1918) Wolves of the Sea (1918) The Case and the Girl (1922)