Samuel Fea

Born in 1872 and dying in 1943, Samuel Fea is a little-known author whose surviving reputation rests mainly on Irish Ned: The Winnipeg Newsy. The book was first published in Toronto by William Briggs in 1910 and is now preserved through projects such as Project Gutenberg and The Online Books Page.

Irish Ned is set in early 1900s Winnipeg and follows a boy who sells newspapers on the street. The story is remembered for its sympathy toward working-class life and for its picture of the city’s social world, giving modern readers a small but vivid window into Canadian urban life of the period.

Reliable biographical information about Fea himself appears to be scarce online, so it is safest to describe him as an author now known chiefly for this single surviving work rather than make broader claims about his life or career.