Background
Harold Bell Wright's story of a southern Arizona cattle ranch.
In 1925, writer James Leo Meehan visited Wright in Tucson to write a
publicity piece to appear in McCall's magazine one month before the
serialization of A Son of His Father. His report included these
comments:
"That evening he
[Wright] proposed that we might drive down into the Arivaca country next
day. It is in the Arivaca country he has laid the scenes of his new
McCall story [A Son of His Father]. It lies at the foot of the
Serritas, a mountain range some sixty miles southwest of Tucson, and
very close to the Mexican border.
The McCall family will soon become familiar with Las Rosas Rancho,
central scene of Wright's new story. We were soon upon the ranch Wright
used for this location. The buildings were there, the country is there,
exactly as he describes it. And the people are precisely the sort of
people he describes in the story. I know. I met some of them, or rather
their prototypes. It was like having the characters step out of a book
and shake hands with you!"
Collecting
A little less common than earlier titles, but not
scarce. Dust jackets are not as scarce as earlier titles. All American first editions were published by Appleton, who always
included a printing number on the last page of the book. Printing
numbers higher than (1) are considered less desirable by collectors than
first printings. Reprints were also published by Burt, Ryerson,
and Hodder & Stoughton.
Total sales: 268,370
Review of Book by Dr.
Joyce Kinkead Copyright 1979 by Joyce
Kinkead. Used by Permission
Wright's
eleventh novel, A Son of His Father (1925), is similar to the
entertaining Zane Grey western. In
it Wright still use the picturesque setting of Arizona.
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