by Rusty Burke
Robert Ervin Howard (1906-1936) ranks among the greatest writers
of action and adventure stories. The creator of Conan the Cimmerian,
Kull of Atlantis, Solomon Kane, Bran Mak Morn, ‘El Borak,’
Sailor Steve Costigan and many other memorable characters, Howard
(known as REH to his millions of fans), in a career that spanned
barely 12 years, wrote well over a hundred stories for the pulp
magazines of his day. While he is widely regarded as the ‘father
of Sword and Sorcery’ and the creator of Conan the Barbarian,
this reputation has been something of a double-edged sword. It
has helped keep his work in the public eye for six decades since
his death, but it has also obscured the astonishing breadth of
his imagination, his talent for mastering a variety of genres
and his ability to weave his magic in both prose and poetry.
Robert E. Howard contributed his most celebrated work to the pre-eminent
fantasy pulp magazine of the era, Weird Tales. However, his stories
also appeared in such diverse publications as Action Stories,
Argosy, Fight Stories, Oriental Stories, Spicy Adventure, Sport
Story, Strange Detective and a number of others. That his stories
were a consistent hit with readers of the time is not surprising,
for he created thrilling, vividly realized adventures populated
by colorful, larger-than-life characters. He was a consummate
and dynamic storyteller. Even after his death publishers continued
for some time to publish his stories or reprint them under other
by-lines. So enduring is the appeal of his work that over a half
century later he continues to gain new fans, introduced to his
tales through paperbacks, comics, and movies. His work has also
inspired subsequent generations of fantasy writers and a loyal
following that has taken to cyberspace to spread the word.
Robert E. Howard was born on January 22 (or possibly January 24),
1906, in the “fading little ex-cowtown” of Peaster,
Texas, in Parker County, just west of Fort Worth. The confusion
surrounding his date of birth arises from Howard celebrating January
22 as his birthday (this was the date he submitted to Who’s
Who Among North American Authors), while his record of birth in
Parker County reads January 24. As his father also gave Robert’s
birthday as 22 January, it is probably safe to assume that is
the correct date.
At the time of Robert’s birth, the Howards lived in Palo
Pinto County, on the banks of Dark Valley Creek. His father, Dr.
Isaac Mordecai Howard, presumably moved his wife temporarily to
the larger community of Peaster to allow readier access to medical
care during her pregnancy. Hester Jane Ervin Howard, Robert’s
mother, did not enjoy robust health, to put it mildly: there was
a history of tuberculosis in her family and Hester Howard was
sickly for much of Robert’s life. Isaac Howard was a country
doctor, a profession that entailed frequent lengthy absences from
home, and thus he may have wished to be certain that his wife
of two years would have adequate medical attention when she delivered
their first, and as it transpired, only child.
Isaac Howard seems to have been possessed of a combination of
wanderlust and ambition that led him to frequently move his family
in search of better opportunities. By the time he was eight, Robert
had lived in at least seven different and widely scattered Texas
towns. In 1915, the family moved to the community of Cross Cut
in Brown County, and they would live in this vicinity - with moves
to Burkett (in Coleman County) in 1917 and finally to Cross Plains
(Callahan County) in 1919 - for the rest of Robert’s and
his mother’s lives.