Luis Senarens

Born in New York City on April 24, 1863, Luis Philip Senarens became one of the busiest writers in American popular fiction. He worked as an editor, publishing aide, and author, and wrote under many pseudonyms across a huge number of stories aimed largely at young readers.

He is best remembered for science-fiction-flavored dime novels, especially the adventures of inventors such as Frank Reade Jr. and Jack Wright. These stories mixed gadgets, airships, steam technology, and nonstop action, and they were so influential that Senarens was later nicknamed "the American Jules Verne."

Senarens died in New York City on December 26, 1939. Though his work was created for cheap mass-market weeklies and story papers, it played an important part in the rise of adventure fiction and early science fiction in the United States.