Paul S. Powers (1905-1971) was a writer of Western fiction and the author of Doc Dillahay, published by Macmillan Company in 1949. He was also a rare book collector and known expert on Western Americana.

Paul was born in 1905 in Little River, Kansas. His father, John Harold Powers, was the town physician. Dr. Powers hoped that his son would follow in his footsteps, but Paul had different aspirations and decided that he wanted to be a writer early in life. He eventually dropped out of high school and began a lifetime of restless wandering across the Southwest. In his late teens, as he struggled to get his early stories accepted for publication, Paul hopped between Kansas and Colorado. As he wandered in the ghost towns in Central City and Blackhawk, Colorado, he accumulated valuable material for later stories and met several unforgettable characters along the way.

From 1928 to 1943, Paul pounded out 12,000 word blood and thunder novelettes every week, featuring his wildly popular characters Sonny Tabor and Kid Wolf, Johnny Forty-five—all written under the pen name Ward M. Stevens—and Freckles Malone, written under the pen name Andrew Griffin. In between writing shoot ‘em ups for his regular heroes, he wrote other novelettes and short stories for Wild West Weekly, some under other pseudonyms and others under his own name.

He was always restless, always looking for new landscape. Despite his grueling writing schedule, Paul managed to move himself and his growing family fifteen times during that period between Kansas, Arizona, California, and New Mexico. Sometimes they moved abruptly, not bothering to take furniture, dishes, or any other accumulations, taking only their clothes, a few personal items, and Paul’s rare book collection. Eventually they settled in Orange, California, in the late 1930s and would stay there until the early 1950s.

In 1943, Wild West Weekly stopped circulation. Afterwards, Paul wrote short stories for other Western magazines, including Western Story Magazine, Thrilling Western, and Ranch Romances. He also wrote his memoir, Pulp Writer: Twenty Years in the American Grub Street, in 1943. It appears that Paul sent it out to just one publisher for consideration, who rejected it due to the lack of interest in pulp fiction at that point in time. Paul put the manuscript away.

After the end of Wild West Weekly, Paul decided to take on his dream of a lifetime: a full-length novel. He proceeded to write Doc Dillahay, a Western based in Arizona in the 1880s with a protagonist, John Dillahay, that was fashioned after Paul’s own father. In 1949, Doc Dillahay was published by the Macmillan Company. The novel was well received by critics and readers alike, but didn’t provide Paul with the financial security that he had enjoyed as a pulp writer.

Broke and discouraged, Paul and his wife Mary moved to Berkeley, California. He was battling a drinking problem that had plagued him since he was a young man and was suffering from major writer’s block. He dabbled in writing, but his main income came from buying and selling rare books and working at various bookstores in the Oakland and Berkeley areas. Any money he made from pulp writing was long gone.

Paul Powers died in 1971. His eldest son, Jack, had died in 1964 from alcoholism, and Paul carried his death as a very heavy burden. Circumstances behind his cause of death are unclear, but what is certain is that he suffered from a broken heart due to the death of Jack.

Paul’s personal papers, which included the Pulp Writer manuscript, were packed away in two boxes and stored in his daughter Pat’s attic. In 1999, 28 years after his death and 56 years after it was written, the manuscript was rediscovered by Pat and Paul’s granddaughter Laurie. Also found were over 150 letters between Paul and his editors at Wild West Weekly, a few unpublished short stories, correspondence from other pulp writers, and over a dozen letters from his son Jack during the last years of his life.