Walter D. Edmonds

Walter D. Edmonds (1903-1998) was an American writer renowned for his historical novels set in upstate New York, particularly along the Erie Canal and during the Revolutionary War. Born in Boonville, New York, he graduated from Harvard in 1926 and published his first novel, Rome Haul, in 1929, followed by his most famous work, Drums Along the Mohawk (1936), which was adapted into a film by John Ford. His children's book The Matchlock Gun (1941) won the Newbery Medal, and he authored over 30 books, including Bert Breen's Barn (1975), which earned the National Book Award for Young People's Literature.