I write a drabble (100 word story) based on the historical happens in the world of Edgar Rice Burroughs. The drabbles are posted on the ERBzine Facebook page daily and on the ERBzine website as "Robert's Drabbles" on a monthly basis.

Here's the item for today - the 419 entry in this series. The photo is of the Van Nuys, California High School circa 1930.

July 28, 2019 and on this day 89 years ago in 1930, Edgar Rice Burroughs decided that he was pleased with Miss Adele Bischoff’s manuscript editing. 

She had been recommended to him by Van Nuys High School principal, J. P. Inglis. Burroughs promptly sent her The Dancing Girl of the Leper King and three installments of Tarzan and the Leopard Men. ERB’s employed freelance editor Adele Bischoff as he readied the first books of Edgar Rice Burroughs, Inc. for publication. Irwin Porges, in Edgar Rice Burroughs: The Man Who Created Tarzan (1st edition, 455-456, 758), presumes that this high school English teacher from Van Nuys, California assisted with Tarzan the Invincible, and expressly states that she edited The Dancing Girl of the Leper King (Jungle Girl) and Tarzan and the Leopard Men. Although Bischoff may have corrected galley proofs, she also addressed the actual manuscript for Leopard Men. ERB, in a letter to Bischoff, complimented her “painstaking and intelligent editing.”

Porges’ final reference to this editor-English teacher is in regard to ERB’s submission to Bischoff of three chapters of Leopard Men on October 2, 1931. Although Porges provided no documentation of additional contact between the two, the fact that ERB began writing City of Gold just 50 days later on November 21 (completing it January 7, 1932) is circumstantial evidence that Bischoff likely is responsible for the abnormalities in the latter novel. 

Miss Bischoff was assigned to Van Nuys High School on September 11, 1922. The photo is of the high school in 1923. I would appreciate any additional information about Adele Bischoff.

“New Sheriff in Town” is the drabble for today.

“Mr. Inglis, my name is Edgar Rice Burroughs.”

“As in Tarzan Edgar Rice Burroughs?”

“Yes, guilty as charged.”

“Love your work. I’m a big fan. How can I help? You don’t have children or grandchildren in school here, do you?”

“Nothing like that. I’m forming my own publishing company. I need an editor and proofreader. I don’t want a person who’s afraid to hurt my feelings. I want someone who’ll really edit my manuscripts before I publish them.

“You want Adele Bischoff. She’d edit the Ten Commandments down to four and give the writer a C for lack of brevity.”