R. S. Warren (Robert Stanley Warren) Bell

Born in 1871 at Long Preston, Yorkshire, Robert Stanley Warren Bell grew up in a large clerical family and spent much of his childhood in Henley-in-Arden, Warwickshire. He was educated at St John's School, Leatherhead, and began his career in journalism in the 1890s, working on Tit-Bits and later the Evening News.

Bell went on to write fiction, essays, and journalism, but he is especially associated with The Captain, the magazine for boys and "old boys" that he served as first editor. During his time there, he published his own school stories and helped foster the kind of lively school fiction that became hugely popular; the magazine was also an early home for work by P. G. Wodehouse. His later books were largely written for younger readers and often returned to school settings.

He married Edithe M. Barry in 1905 and died on September 26, 1921, in Brighton after a long illness. Although he is less widely known today than some of the writers around him, his career places him firmly in the lively world of late Victorian and Edwardian popular fiction.