Howard Pease

    By Truman Price

     Back in high school, decades ago, Howard Pease was one of my must-read favorite authors.  I’ve read a few of his books again in the last few years, and have been pleasantly surprised.  He holds up very well.   In some ways he may be better than I realized back then, when I thought of him as a real page-turner: when I came to the end of a chapter I couldn’t wait to get into the next.  I probably had no concept of the depth of his social commentary.

   The anti-racism of Shipwreck; the labor struggles in Fog Horns; the pathos of Heart of Danger (in which a young Jewish violinist, with a great career ahead, abandons all, although he doesn't want to, to become a spy in wartime Germany)  were all surprises for me when I began to reread Pease as an adult.

     Howard Pease was a native Californian, from Stockton on the east edge of the San Francisco Bay area (up a long channel in the delta). He attended Stanford, interrupted for two years with an army unit in Europe, graduated and taught high school.  He had intended to become a writer since sixth grade (see Bound for Singapore).  During two summers he shipped out as a wiper in the engine room of a freighter - one of the few ship jobs an inexperienced youth could get.  Soon after he began teaching he began The Tattooed Man, using new experiences from two such voyages and a walking trip from Marseilles along the coast to Italy.

The Tattooed Man  New York: Doubleday, Doran &Co, 1926.   Strange adventures befall Tod Moran, mess boy of the tramp steamer "Araby," upon his first voyage from San Francisco to Genoa, via the Panama Canal.  He is searching for his older brother, who disappeared on a voyage.  Tod is a mess boy and later a coal stoker on a freighter out of San Francisco bound for Marseilles. It is a vividly realistic portrayal of life aboard tramp freighters in the inter-war years. Also interesting is the treatment of drug addiction in the days when it was perhaps less common.
 
   Pease had his first short story published in 1921, in American Boy, and 22 book titles published between 1926 and 1959.  Most of them have to do with the adventures of young Tod Moran, beginning as the most junior member of the crew on a series of tramp steamers, working his way up to First Mate.  Looking out for him on the early adventures were two linguistically stereotyped “black gang” characters, Toppy the Cockney (also referred to as the Limey) and Sven the Squarehead. Despite his loose characterizations of the two, which might be easily interpreted as racist, they were his guideposts and safety net.  There is usually an honest if distant father figure, Captain Jarvis.  Many of Tod’s adventures are motivated by a search for a lost father or older brother.  Might make one wonder... but the first chapter of "Singapore" gives a clue, when the protagonist by chance selects the story of young Blondel searching the desert for Richard the Lion-Hearted as the transplanted plot of his first succesful story.  
 
Skipping ahead 31 years ... 

Shipwreck: The Strange Adventures of Renny Mitchum, Mess Boy of the Trading Schooner 'Samarang.'   Doubleday, 1957.  237 pp.  In this later book the protagonist is like a younger Tod Moran, shipping out with no allies in a probably vain attempt to discover what has happened to his father, apparently shipwrecked and lost on a vague island in the least known part of the South Pacific.  Pease deals with racism in his usual manner, head-on, when Renny has to take instruction from a Filipino cook:  At first young Renny shows disdain for the "brown-skinned messman", certain that he could not amount to much.  Yet as the plot unfolds, it is the Filipino messman who not only says Renny's life, but gives him direction: the brown-skinned cook turns out to be both a skilled psychologist and the wisest person aboard.  Later, when we are among illiterate savages, one of whom is a sinister menace, we learn that among all groups there are both good and bad.  Without revealing the plot, there are some interesting twists, especially after the second shipwreck.

 
Back to the 1930’s, a book set among labor problems:
 
   Fog Horns.   Doubleday, 1937.  A mystery set on the docks and waterfront streets of San Francisco; a young man buys a seaman's certificate to work on the Araby and is plunged into intrigue, with a strong working-man's point of view. For one thing, I learned why the longshoremen had antipathy toward "college boys."  During the dock strike the year before, the companies had sent busses over to UC Berkeley where students were recruited part-time at top wages to take the jobs of the workers during the strike.  I wonder if this is where I got my early radicalism, subliminally from reading Howard Pease?  Well, it is no wonder that it was kicked it out of the libraries!   A nice book.    
 
 
Bibliography, books (repeated descriptions in parentheses):
 
The Tattooed Man   (same description as above: Strange adventures befall Tod Moran, mess boy of the tramp steamer "Araby," upon his first voyage from San Francisco to Genoa, via the Panama Canal.  He is searching for his older brother, who disappeared on a voyage.  Tod is a mess boy and later a coal stoker on a freighter out of San Francisco bound for Marseilles. It is a vividly realistic portrayal of life aboard tramp freighters in the inter-war years. Interesting treatment of drug addiction in the days when it wasn't so painfully common.)
1926  New York: Doubleday, Doran &Co.     In stock -

The Jinx Ship
 Tod Moran, stranded and jobless, signs onto the "Congo", a ship with a bad rep, and bang! - he's in the middle of several mysteries. The plot jumps right to it.  He and his college-type chum get a bit of a scare when captured by Caribbean ex-slaves bent on a mysterious voodoo ritual, but they're of course rescued by the black messman from their ship. There's much more - read it.  1927,  Doubleday, Doran    In stock -

  Shanghai Passage - Being a tale of mystery, adventure and mutiny on the high seas in which Stuart Ormsby is shanghaied aboard the tramp steamer "Nanking" bound for ports on the China coast.     1929,  Doubleday, Doran   In stock -

The Gypsy Caravan 
   A change of pace for Pease, this is a time-slip novel, in which Betty and Joe travel with the gypsies and meet Robin Hood, Richard the Lionhearted, Roland and other hero figures from European history.  Not among the more successful of his books, in my opinion.  1930,  Doubleday, Doran
 
Secret Cargo
   The story of Larry Matthews and his dog Sambo, forecastle mates on the tramp steamer "Creole Trader", from New Orleans to the South Seas.
   1931,  Doubleday, Doran.    In stock - inquire.
 
The Ship Without a Crew
   More strange adventures for Tod Moran, now third mate of the tramp steamer "Araby".
1934,  Doubleday, Doran    In stock - inquire.
 
Wind in the Rigging
   Tod Moran on the tramp steamer "Sumatra," New York to North Africa.  1935,  NY Doubleday, Doran   Sold.

Hurricane Weather
   Yachting in the South Seas; a Tod Moran mystery.
1936  Doubleday, Doran    In stock - inquire.
 
Fog Horns  (A mystery set on the docks and waterfront streets of San Francisco; a young man buys a seaman's certificate to work on the Araby and is plunged into intrigue, with a strong working-man's point of view. For one thing, I learned why the longshoremen had antipathy toward "college boys."  During the dock strike the year before, the companies had sent busses over to UC Berkeley where students were recruited part-time at top wages to take the jobs of the workers during the strike.  I wonder if this is where I got my early radicalism, subliminally from reading Howard Pease?  Well, it is no wonder that it was kicked it out of the libraries!   A nice book.)      1937, Doubleday, Doran
 
Captain Binnacle
   1938,  Dodd, Mead&Co.
 
Highroad to Adventure.   Tod Moran, a trip to Mexico and a silver mine mystery.  1939,  Doubleday, Doran.    Sold.
 
Jungle River.   An American boy searches for his lost father in the New Guinea jungle; praos and dugouts.   1938, Doubleday Doran.    In stock - inquire.
 
Long Wharf: A Story of Young San Francisco.  Story of a cabin boy abandoned in a derelict ship in SF Bay in 1849. Illustrated by Manning de V. Lee. 1939, Dodd, Mead & Co.    In stock - inquire.

The Black Tanker.  A Stanford student gets word that his father, a doctor working in China, has been seriously injured in a Japanese bombing raid. The only way he can get to China is to sign on as an engine wiper on the tanker Zambora, with Captain Jarvis and mate Tod Moran, on a fuel tanker carrying oil to the Japanese bases in China. There is a murder on board, a storm at sea, and some adventures with the Japanese and Chinese after they arrive. Seen through American political neutrality with a strong distaste for Japanese Imperialism, and a sprinkling of nasty Japanese.
1941, Doubleday, Doran.  In stock - inquire.

Night Boat and other Tod Moran mysteries.
1942  Doubleday, Doran and Co.  In stock - inquire.
 
Thunderbolt House.   One of Pease's finest novels, a mystery involving three young people on their own in San Francisco during the 1907 Earthquake and Fire. Winner of the California Commonwealth Book Award.  How any library could dump this novel is beyond me!!  Nice endpaper spread showing families fleeing the fire. 1944, Doubleday.
 
Heart of Danger. A spy story:  The chief figure is a brilliant young Jewish violinist, with a great career ahead, who gives it all up to become a spy in wartime Germany.  Tod Moran, third mate of the tramp steamer ‘Araby"”  is involved in helping smuggle the young spy into the continent, and somewhat in the difficulties of his decision --   An excellent story with unexpected twists;  Pease again blends pulp cliche, concern for justice, and occasional flashes of literary genius.   Incidentally, much of the action is around the town of Royen in France, where Pease had been stationed at an army hospital for a year and where he played first violin in a 40-piece orchestra that played locally.  1946, Doubleday.    Sold.
 
Bound for Singapore.  “Being a True and Faithful Account of the Making of an Adventurer.“ This adventure includes an autobiographical glimpse of Pease's beginnings, decades later; the mystery is not about exotic dangers but rather a stowaway prize-winning dachshund (Pease later raised prize-winning dachshunds) on a trip from San Francisco to a show in New York - but still with plenty of mystery and danger.  While less exotic than most, it is well-written and straight-forward, and the first chapter, "Prelude", is a detailed account of how young Chet/Howard first became a writer, how he and friends selected his first stories, and why he first shipped out, bound for "Singapore" (Anywhere), to gain experience: a hard-to-find and interesting Pease title. 1948, Doubleday.  Sold.
 
Dark Adventure  (reprinted as Road Kid)..  Somewhat of a change of pace, a youth (and the author) asea on the roads of America.  A hitchhiking boy suffers amnesia, is robbed by vicious hobos, finds himself among children peddling single sticks of reefer cigarettes in high school parking lots, which of course leads to hot-rodders deliberately ramming honest drivers on the highways... everything works out fine, of course. 1950, Doubleday.  In stock - inquire.
 
Captain of the Araby,  A Tod Moran book; the Captain of the title is Capt. Jarvis, with whom Tod sails in most of the books.   1953, Doubleday.
 
 Shipwreck: The Strange Adventures of Renny Mitchum, Mess Boy of the Trading Schooner 'Samarang.'"  
   (The protagonist is like a younger Tod Moran, shipping out with no allies in a probably vain attempt to discover what has happened to his father, apparently shipwrecked and lost on a vague island in the least known part of the South Pacific.  Pease deals with racism in his usual manner, head-on, when Renny has to take instruction from a Filipino cook:  At first young Renny shows disdain for the "brown-skinned messman", certain that he could not amount to much.  Yet as the plot unfolds, it is the Filipino messman who not only says Renny's life, but gives him direction: the brown-skinned cook turns out to be both a skilled psychologist and the wisest person aboard.  Later, when we are among illiterate savages, one of whom is a sinister menace, we learn that among all groups there are both good and bad.  Without revealing the plot, there are some interesting twists, especially after the second shipwreck.)  Doubleday, 1957.  in stock -
 
Mystery on Telegraph Hill.  A Tod Moran mystery set in San Francisco.
Doubleday, 1961.
 
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   In 1939 Pease gave a rather blistering speech to 400 female youth services librarians at a conference sponsored by the ALA in Berkeley and later known as the "Sayers Institute" - chaired by Dorothy Sayers. His main theme was the feminization of children's  literature: "wholly and solely a woman’s world -- a completely feminine world," which was producing disinterest by young males - “we attempt to draw over their heads a beautiful curtain of silk... but the children go on.... Let’s catch up with our children, catch up with our schools, catch up with this world around us. Let’s be leaders, not followers, and let’s be leaders with courage."  His speech was met by “a barrage of vehement defense" from the audience, according to reporters.  Dorothy Sayers stressed his positive aspects; she made it clear that she agreed with Pease about the need for more realistic books for children.
    The next week the Newbery Medal was awarded to Thimble Summer.  During the next year the debate continued, including a series of signed editorials by C. C. Certain in the Elementary English Review.  In “What Are Little Boys Made Of?” he described Thimble Summer as possessing the “faded prettiness” of a “gossamer summer bouquet” but no appeal to “the average tousle- headed American boy.”... the next year the Newbery committee over-compensated, in my opinion, by giving the award to an over-the-top aggressively American tough-boy rendition of Daniel Boone, by James Daugherty. Not a book I ever had much interest in as a boy.  Howard Pease won only two awards in his career, the California Commonwealth Book Award in 1944 for Thunderbolt House and the Child Study Children’s Book Award of Bank Street College in 1946, “for a book that deals realistically with problems in the child’s world”, for Heart of Danger.
 
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    Howard Pease's papers are at the University of the Pacific in Stockton, and are available for research.  We generally have very few Howard Pease novels in stock, other than my personal collection - although I just acquired a collection of 15 titles, which I'll list as quickly as I can (inquire) .  I set what I think is a fair price on them, and away they go! ... so clearly there are others besides myself who still like his writing.
     Truman