Archives West Finding Aid

Thomas A. Curry, Jr. (1900-1976) was a prominent American writer of adventure stories, novels, and novelettes. His parents were involved in writing for the theater and his father, Thomas Sr., was private secretary to the leading broadway producer David Belasco from 1914 to 1931. Thomas Jr. studied chemical engineering at Columbia University, where he earned a Bachelor of Science degree. While in school he sold his first story to People's Magazine. At age 23 he was hired as a reporter for the New York American, covering the crime beat in the city's tenderloin district. By 1925 he was writing detective stories and in the 1930s became a regular contributor to Detective Fiction Weekly. Curry married and had three children. He became a regular contributor to Texas Rangers magazine, which was launched by Leo Margulies in 1936. In 1939, Thomas created his well known character Bob Pryor, The Rio Kid. The Rio Kid Western became a quarterly publication in October of 1939. During his career Curry wrote numerous western adventures but also pieces dealing with sport, fantasy, history and other topics. In 1955 with the pulp fiction market virtually dead, Curry returned to the engineering profession. He continued to publish new works occasionaly. He began his retirement around 1967 the year in which he donated his papers to the University of Oregon. Curry died in 1976 in Connecticut, where he resided much of his adult life.