EDITOR OF BLACK MASK, 1926-1936

Influential Editor.

Joseph T. Shaw made Black Mask one of the most respected pulp magazines of the 1920s and 1930s. By publishing the early work of such note-worthy writers as Raymond Chandler, Dashiell Hammett, and Erie Stanley Gardner, the magazine helped to define a whole style, commonly known as hard-boiled detective fiction.

Early Career.

Born in 1874 in Gorham, Maine, Shaw edited the campus newspaper at Bowdoin College in Brunswick, Maine. Graduating in 1895, he was briefly employed at the New York Globe and worked for a wool company. He served in World War I, earning the rank of captain and the nickname "Cap." He was also a champion fencer, and when he later lived in New York he was licensed to carry a sword cane. Shaw remained in Europe for five years after the war, distributing food for the American Relief Administration. When he returned to the United...