—FROM THE PUBLISHERS
--KOKOMO DISPATCH, 1904.
--KOKOMO MORNING NEWS, 1904.
Indiana enjoys the distinction of having produced a great number of able fiction writers. Attorney Frank N. Stratton of Kokomo has for years been writing some of the best short stories printed in the leading Eastern magazines.
Mr. Stratton's delightful series, “Pottering Pete,” begun in Wayside Tales some years ago, is being continued in the current numbers of the magazine.
It is always a compliment for a man to be appreciated at home. That Mr. Stratton is not without honor in his own town the following from Kokomo newspapers witness:
There is a remarkable difference between Frank N. Stratton and most of the popular writers of short stories. The Stratton contributions are popular in Kokomo, where he has been known so long. It is not mere local enthusiasm which supports the desire of the people here and in other Indiana cities in this section to read the Stratton stories, but it is an eagerness to see more of the delightful and original work that has been coming from the versatile pen of the Kokomo lawyer. In the years that he has traveled, Frank Stratton has been an observer, one of those careful, sympathetic observers who sees the best and the truest side of any situation, as well as the more humorous. He gets all that there is in a situation, and he knows how to write about it in a way that at- tracts the people. Singularly enough, he is as good a story teller as he is a story writer and the listener frequently misses other things while he listens to what Stratton says.
In the March Everybody's Magazine there is a short story, “Jimmy's Mother." It is a pathetic tale of court and justice, of an aged woman, whose loyalty wins the victory of which the lawyer had despaired. It is a gem of the pathetic sort and makes the reader kinder and better for the reading. In the March Munsey, the story of “The Woman in the Case." It is one of those western stories, teeming with interest and action, showing the author’s intimate knowledge of the country where so much is strenuosity. The broad humanity of hunted Reddy McGuire and the fidelity of Sheriff Dan Rowe to his sense of duty, while yet not unmindful of the heroism of the man he wanted to arrest, are well described. In the March Wayside Tales the story is told of Pottering Pete’s desire for a wife and the investigations he made of a matrimonial grafter. This is the first of a series of Pottering Pete stories that Mr. Stratton will furnish to Wayside Tales, and their clever humor will be well received. — Kokomo Morning News, 1904.
The third series of “Pottering Pete” tales, by Frank N. Stratton of this city, appears in Wayside Tales for February. These products of the pen of the Kokomo writer have been contracted for by the Sampson-Hodges Company of Chicago, owners of Wayside Tales and one of the three great short-story syndicates, the other two being the Daily Story Publishing Company and the McClure Syndicate of New York. The Stratton tales are to be syndicated after publication in Wayside Tales.—Kokomo Dispatch, 1904.