Edward Sylvester Ellis was born April 11, 1840 in Geneva, Ohio, and married Anna M. Deane in 1862. After Anna’s death he married again in 1900, this time to Clara Spalding Brown of Los Angeles. He attended the State Normal School of New Jersey and, while he was little more than a boy, he began teaching. He later went on to become a school principal and superintendent of schools of Trenton. In 1860 he published his most successful book, Seth Jones, or the Captives of the Frontier. It’s sudden, immense success was the catalyst which caused him to abandon teaching in order to concentrate on his writing career.

In 1874 and 1875 Mr. Ellis served as editor of Public Opinion, a Trenton daily newspaper. From 1878 to 1881 he was editor of Golden Days and in 1891 was editor of Holiday. Both magazines were for children. Edward Ellis specialized in boys’ stories, inspirational biography, and history for both children and adults. He was a major author during the era of inexpensive fiction of the nineteenth century which was known as the "dime novel." Because he wrote under dozens of pseudonyms, as well as under his own name, it is virtually impossible to know just exactly how many books Mr. Ellis wrote. It is believed there were hundreds.

Edward was a young schoolteacher when he wrote his first novel mentioned above (Seth Jones). Many of his books were adventure tales of the frontier with settings ranging from the days when the eastern United States was being settled, to the expansion of the American West of the late nineteenth century. Using the pseudonyms Bruin Adams or J.F.C. Adams, Ellis claimed to be a nephew of renowned Western frontiersman James Capen ("Grizzly") Adams, and in this guise he published several novels. One of his most popular characters in these books was Deerfoot who was a native American. His works were considered to be well written by the standards that prevailed in that day, and were enjoyed by adults as well as by young people. 

Until the middle eighteen eighties Ellis wrote, primarily, works of fiction. After that time, he turned to writing accounts of historical events, mostly for adults. He issued a number of personal statements about whatever was most important in the minds of the public of that day. In his histories he was always fair in his opinions on differences within the nation, but internationally he espoused American preeminence. He said: "The record of no people can approach it in magnificence of achievement as regards art, science, education, literature, invention, and all that makes for true progress." (From Tent to White House, 1899, p.7). He believed that the normal expectancy of human life is a hundred years, that a teacher should excel in athletic prowess, and that "the vices of cigarette smoking, of tobacco chewing, of beer and alcoholic drinking, threaten the very existence of the rising generation." (Continental Primary Physiology, 1885, p.9). 

He was the author of The History of Our Country (1896), The Standard History of the United States (1898), Juvenile Stories, and Masonic Stories including "Low Twelve" and "High Twelve". 

Edward Ellis died at Cliff Island, Maine in 1916 at the age of 76.

Lodge: Trenton 5, Now Trenton Cyrus #5
Residence: Upper Montclair