Rex Beach

Rex Ellingwood Beach (1877-1949) was an American novelist and playwright who went north around 1900 during the gold-rush years and spent roughly five years prospecting near Nome without striking it rich. What he came away with was material. His first novel, The Spoilers (1906), drew on a real scheme by corrupt officials to seize gold claims around Nome; it finished eighth on that year's bestseller list and was filmed five times between 1914 and 1955. He published more than thirty books, mostly adventure fiction set on the northern frontier, and admirers called him the Victor Hugo of the North. He also took a silver medal in water polo at the 1904 St. Louis Olympics.