Capt. A.E. Dingle (1874-1947) was a popular pulp author of nautical tales from 1914 to around 1941. Born in poverty in the U.K., he went to sea at the age of 14 and worked his way up from an apprentice seaman to a captain. He worked on both sailing ships and steamships.
During his time at sea, he was shipwrecked four times. But he lost his master papers in his 40s when the ship he was in charge of literally blew up underneath him. This was in 1911. Looking for work, a friend recommended he head for New York City. There, he worked various odd jobs, soon bringing his family over from the U.K.
Then he was fortunate to be at a dinner that organized the Adventurers Club, and he became a founding member. But more importantly, Arthur S. Hoffman, editor of Adventure, heard him tell of his adventures at sea and asked him to write it up as an article, which he did.
But as he did it in longhand, he was told to submit it typed. Not able to afford a stenographer, he taught himself to type, and this started his writing career. He was soon also submitting works to Munsey. This was pretty good when you consider that he had but a basic education, which ended when he went to sea. The basic writing advice he was given was to have “a distinct beginning, a middle, and an ending.” His works would appear as by “A.E. Dingle,” “Captain Dingle,” and “Sinbad.”
He must have been fairly successful as he bought his own sloop, The Gauntlet, and sailed it along the coast, writing on board. His sister Mary was also an avid sailor, and she was apparently the model for several of the heroines in his stories. Sadly, she apparently drowned in a boating accident with him later on.
In 1917, Dingle decided to move his family to Bermuda for the warmer weather. Due to a wound he received in the Boxer Rebellion in China, the colder climate of New York didn’t agree with him. His family went ahead, and he was to sail his sloop. Unable to find anyone to come with him, he did so with just a small dog. And delays meant he left in the summer of 1918. Whereby he was hit by storms and then one of the worst hurricanes to hit the area. He was lucky to make it there alive. This was the subject of an article he wrote. Later, he would move back to England, where he passed away.
He did write an autobiography titled A Modern Sinbad: An Autobiography in 1933, published in the U.S. as Rough Hewn. I wish someone would reprint this in a reasonably priced edition with his name. (Wildside Press? Black Dog Books? someone?)
If you want to try his fiction, there are a couple of nice collections of his works. Wildside Press did Out of the Wreck and Other Nautical Tales From the Pulps (2006). It has eight stories, plus a Sherlock Holmes pastiche.
Black Dog Books did Old Sails in 2014, which has 11 stories, thankfully only one repeated from Out of the Wreck. It also has his article on his experience in that hurricane and a bibliography of all his works. The stories here are quite varied. Wildside also reprinted one of his novels, Ships of Strife, and Armchair Fiction reprinted The Age-Old Kingdom in their Lost-World/Lost-Race Series, and I hope to read and review it at some point.
Dingle is an interesting person, and I don’t know why more of his work hasn’t been reprinted.
A tip of the pulp hat to Sai Shankar‘s Pulp Flakes blog and Steve Holland‘s Bear Alley blog for biographical info on Dingle.
