Ralph Milne Farley

Roger Sherman Hoar (April 8, 1887 – October 10, 1963) was an American state senator and assistant Attorney General, for the state of Massachusetts. He wrote and published science fiction under the pseudonym of Ralph Milne Farley.

Family

Hoar was the son of Sherman Hoar, grandson of former US Attorney General Ebenezer Rockwood Hoar, great-grandson of Samuel Hoar, and great-great grandson of American founding father Roger Sherman, a signer of the Declaration of Independence.

Education and career

Born in Waltham, Massachusetts, Hoar attended Phillips Exeter Academy. He then received his bachelor's degree from Harvard University in 1909 and his law degree from Harvard Law School in 1911. During World War I, he served in the United States Army Coast Artillery Corps. Hoar was a former Massachusetts assistant attorney general. He was a member of the Marquette University faculty in the graduate school of engineering, and also "taught scientific subjects at Harvard, the Coast Artillery School, ndthe Ordnance School of Application". He also served as attorney of Bucyrus Erie Company of South Milwaukee, Wisconsin.

Politician

Hoar served in the Massachusetts State Senate in 1911 and was involved with the Democratic Party and campaigned for women's suffrage. Hoar was also an organizer and major force behind the enactment of the Employee Unemployment Benefits Act, served on the Commission to Compile Information & Data, 1917, taught mathematics and engineering, patented a system for aiming large guns by the stars, and authored landmark works on constitutional and patent law.

Writer

Under the pseudonym Ralph Milne Farley, Hoar wrote a considerable amount of pulp-magazine science fiction during the period between the world wars, appearing in such publications as ''Argosy All-Story Weekly'' and ''Amazing Stories,'' as well as occasional essays for ''The American Mercury,'' ''Scientific American,'' and science fiction fanzines. His works include ''The Radio Man'' and its numerous sequels, chiefly interplanetary and inner-world adventure yarns in the tradition of Edgar Rice Burroughs, with whom he was friends; Hoar also wrote a number of archetypal time-travel-paradox tales, collected in book form as ''The Omnibus of Time'', and "The House of Ecstasy", which has been frequently reprinted since its initial appearance in ''Weird Tales'' (April 1938).

According to one of his editors, from 1932 on the "Farley" byline was actually used exclusively for collaboration between Hoar and his daughter Caroline, who had been writing under the pen name of Jacqueline Farley and by 1933 was an engineering student at Radcliffe.Palmer, Raymond A. "Ralph Milne Farley author biography". ''Science Fiction Digest'', July 1933. "Ralph Milne Farley is TWO people! Here's the dope; Ralph Milne Farley, up to January 1, 1932, was Roger Sherman Hoar, A.B., M.A. LL. B. After that he began writing in collaboration with his daughter, Caroline Prescott Hoar, who had been writing under the pen name of ‘Jacqueline Farley.' Their combined efforts have been published under the name Ralph Milne Farley exclusively since the combine was effected. Miss Hoar is a student at Radcliffe, majoring in mechanical and electrical engineering. She is responsible for the improvement in Farley's “The Golden City” over previous works...."

Upon relocating to the Midwest, where he worked as a corporate attorney for the firm of Bucyrus-Erie, Hoar joined the Milwaukee Fictioneers, whose members included Stanley G. Weinbaum, Robert Bloch, and Raymond A. Palmer. When Chicago-based Ziff-Davis Publishing Company bought the ailing ''Amazing Stories'' in 1938, Hoar was offered, but declined, the magazine's editorship and recommended Palmer, who held the position through the 1940s.

Books

As Roger Sherman Hoar

*''The Tariff Manual.'' Privately printed, 1912.
*''Constitutional Conventions: Their Nature, Powers, and Limitations.'' Boston: Little, Brown, and Company, 1917.
*''Patents: What a Business Executive Should Know About Patents.'' New York: The Ronald Press Company, 1926. Revised edition: Patent Tactics and Law. 1935, 1950.
*''Conditional Sales: Law and Local Practices for Executive and Lawyer.'' New York: The Ronald Press Company, 1929. Revised edition: 1937.
*''Unemployment Insurance in Wisconsin.'' South Milwaukee, Wisconsin: Stuart Press, 1932. Revised edition: Wisconsin Unemployment Insurance, 1934.

As Ralph Milne Farley

*''Smothered Seas'' (story, with Stanley G. Weinbaum). Published in ''Astounding Stories'', January 1936.
*''Dangerous Love'' (stories). London: Utopian Publications, 1946.
*''The Immortals'' (novel). Published in ''The Argosy'' in 1934, later reprinted in Canada by Popular Publications Inc., 1947.
*''The Radio Man'' (novel), 1924. Los Angeles: Fantasy Publishing Co., 1948. Paperback edition retitled ''An Earthman on Venus'' (Avon Books). st of "Radio Man" series*''The Hidden Universe'' (two novellas). Los Angeles: Fantasy Publishing Co., 1950.
*''The Omnibus of Time'' (stories). Los Angeles: Fantasy Publishing Co., 1950.
*'' Strange Worlds'' (contains ''The Radio Man'' and ''The Hidden Universe''). Los Angeles: Fantasy Publishing Co., 1953.
*''The Radio Beasts'' (novel), 1925. New York: Ace Books, 1964. nd of "Radio Man" series*''The Radio Planet'' (novel), 1926. New York: Ace Books, 1964. rd of "Radio Man" series*''The Radio Flyers'' (novel), 1929. Rialto, California: Pulpville Press, 2006.
*''The Radio Gun-Runners'' (novel), 1930. equel to "The Radio Flyers"*''Tong War'' (novel, written in collaboration with E. Hoffman Price). Chertsey, England: Blue Mushroom, 2002.
*''Pe-Ra, Daughter of the Sun'' (novella). Rialto, California: Pulpville Press, 2005.
*''The Radio Minds of Mars'' (novel), 1955. Rialto, California: Pulpville Press, 2005. th of "Radio Man" series*''The Ralph Milne Farley Collection Book 1'' (stories). Rialto, California: Pulpville Press, 2005.
*''The Ralph Milne Farley Collection Book 2'' (stories). Rialto, California: Pulpville Press, 2005.
*''The Golden City'' (novel), 1933. Rialto, California: Pulpville Press, 2006.
*''The Radio War'' (novel), 1932. Rialto, California: Pulpville Press, 2006.
*''The Radio Menace'' (novel), 1930. Rialto, California: Pulpville Press, 2008. th of "Radio Man" series

Notes

External links

CONSTITUTIONAL CONVENTIONS:''Their Nature, Powers, and Limitations''Hoar Family Papers, 1774-1940
at Concord Free Public Library
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The Radio Beast Review


at Political Graveyard

{{DEFAULTSORT:Hoar, Roger Sherman
1887 births
1963 deaths
Politicians from Waltham, Massachusetts
Politicians from Concord, Massachusetts
Writers from Concord, Massachusetts
Military personnel from Massachusetts
Politicians from Milwaukee
Harvard Law School alumni
Phillips Exeter Academy alumni
Marquette University faculty
Massachusetts lawyers
Wisconsin lawyers
Novelists from Massachusetts
Novelists from Wisconsin
Democratic Party Massachusetts state senators
20th-century American novelists
American male novelists
American science fiction writers
The Harvard Lampoon alumni
American male short story writers
20th-century American short story writers
20th-century American male writers
20th-century American lawyers
20th-century members of the Massachusetts General Court