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Hal George Evarts, Jr. was born on February 8, 1915 in Huchinson, Kansas. His father was the author Hal George Evarts. He attended Stanford University in 1932 and received his Bachelor of Arts. Evarts married Dorothea Van Dusen Abbott in 1942 and had three children. He was a member of the Western Writers of America from 1959 to 1960, serving as both a member and a vice-president. He was also affiliated with Zeta Psi and Sigma Delta Chi. In 1936-1937 he took his version of the "Grand Tour"--a knapsack trip around the world. Among his papers is a four volume diary of that trip, from Paris to central China. Evarts served in the U.S. Army during World War II from 1943 to 1945 in Europe with the 89th Infantry division. Evarts died August 26, 1989 at the age of 74.
Evarts worked as a writer from 1940 until his death in 1989. In that time he worked briefly as a screenwriter in Hollywood, a trade journal and newspaper reporter, as well as for the New York Herald Tribune Paris edition in 1939. Evarts was a mainstream western pulp writer. He composed over one hundred short stories to magazines and newspapers as well as numerous individual novels.
Source: Contemporary Authors Online, Gale, 2003.
The Hal Evarts, Jr. papers are divided into three series. The first contains correspondence, divided into incoming and outgoing. One file, 1956-1960, contains the records and correspondence of the membership committee, Western Writers of America. Since the collection was processed at various times and contains addenda, the correspondence may not be arranged chronologically as a whole series.
The second series contains both short story and novel length manuscripts. The manuscripts are divided by work and arranged alphabetically. Also included in this series is a single folder containing a screenplay written by Evarts. The screenplay "The Restless Gun" is in the same style as the short stories and novels.
Finally, the remainder of the collection is grouped under miscellaneous. This series contains tearsheets of Evarts in published material. This series also contains royalty statements received by Evarts for his works. Four personal journals concerning Evarts' world tour when he was in his twenties are also present in the series. The series concludes also includes bound materials containing published work of Evarts. Two of the folders contain German magazines with Evarts' short stories in German. Also included is a Yearbook of Stanford writing from 1936 and a recognition of Evarts' membership of "The Other Padres," a group of writers in the San Diego, California area.
A box of published books by Evarts was also part of the collection. However, these have been removed and are housed separately.