Edwin Robert Walker

Born in Rochester, New York, in 1862 and later active in New Jersey, Edwin Robert Walker built a career in law as well as letters. Available biographical records describe him as an American lawyer and judge, and his 1917 publication The Lenni Lenape, or Delaware Indians identifies him as a chancellor of New Jersey.

Walker is remembered by readers mainly for historical writing rooted in New Jersey. The Lenni Lenape, or Delaware Indians began as an address before the New Jersey Historical Society in Newark on October 31, 1917, and was later printed in Somerville, New Jersey. He is also credited with A History of Trenton, 1679-1929, a large-scale history prepared under the auspices of the Trenton Historical Society.

He died in Trenton, New Jersey, in 1932. What survives most clearly is the range of his interests: public life, regional memory, and the long history of the Delaware Valley. For modern listeners, his books offer a window into how early twentieth-century writers tried to gather and preserve the historical record of their communities.