Ned Brewster Series by Chauncey Hawkins

Old storied publishing houses did not specialize in juvenile series in the early 20th century. Of course, the bread and butter of these firms were adult fiction and non fiction. But there were series done. Little , Brown was an old venerable house founded in 1837 by Charles C. Little and James Brown.

Its series books included those written by Mary Wells Smith, George Atwater, Roy Snell and a number of others. In Mattson there are 24 series listed. These series are a bit harder to come by. I suspect because the quality of the binding was better than the average series book and subsequently the price was higher (generally more than $1.00) the print runs must have been relatively small. This is especially true for series authored by unknown writers.

Today's series is the three volume Ned Brewster seres written by Chauncey Hawkins. The books (as with all of the series books published by Little, Brown) came with dust jackets. The stories are about big game hunting with guns and cameras. The illustrations are from photographs taken by the author.

Chauncey Hawkins (1887 -1930) was a pastor as well as an author. He was from Vaccaville, California. He served at various churches throughout Massachusetts, Seattle and San Francisco. He wrote several religiously oriented books in addition to the three Ned Brewster volumes. Hawkins may not have been playing with a full deck. While living in Boston he owned a bear cub named Blitzen that wheeled the carriage of his four year old son son.

When he died it was not a wild animal that got him but rather just a mundane auto accident outside Visalia, California.

1. Ned Brewster's Year in the Big Woods 1912
2. Ned Brewster's Bear Hunt 1913
3. Ned Brewster's Caribou Hunt 1914