The Long Arm Of The Mounted is a collection of four tales of adventure about the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, set in the frozen wastes of the Canadian Northwest. One of the stories comes from a 1925 issue of Adventure. The other three were either: (a) first published in this volume; (b) retitled from their original appearance in a magazine; or (c) are stories from issues of magazines which have not yet been indexed in The FictionMags Index (since the book has no source acknowledgments, it's hard to know which!). Rather than depicting an action scene, the dust jacket artwork by artist Stephen J. Voorhies (1898-?) features an almost idyllic scene with a Mountie in his bright red uniform saying goodbye to his sweetheart in her simple blue and white dress. His native Canadian scout is in the background preparing a canoe for their mission. By 1948, Northwest fiction had developed a strong female readership (the popular pulp magazine North-West Stories had been retitled North-West Romances in 1937 with that in mind). McGraw-Hill’s art director may have requested that Voorhies illustrate this particular scene for the dust jacket in order to increase the appeal of the book to female readers.CONTENTS:THE MYSTERY OF THE GHOST GOLD • 7 MANNIKIN TALK • 67 (Adventure, January 30, 1925)A RELIC OF THE VIKINGS • 83 (Later reprinted in Pocket Book Weekly Storyteller, June 4, 1949)SHEPHERD OF THE STORM • 101About The Author (excerpted from Brian Alan Burhoe's excellent article "The Greatest Authors Of North-West Mounted Police Fiction" on civilizedbears.com):"William Byron Mowery (1899-1957) was known as “The Zane Grey of the Canadian Northwest.”A mentor, naturalist and novelist, Mowery was born in the village of Adelphia, a farming community of Ross County, in the forested Appalachian region of Ohio. From earliest boyhood William was dissatisfied with what he called his “backwoods” existence.In an article in a 1933 edition of the Auburn, New York, Citizen-Advertiser, introducing their upcoming serialization of a Mowery Northwesten novel, the paper wrote: “William Byron Mowery, writer of stories about the woods and out-doors, was himself born in the ‘backwoods’ country but throughout his childhood wanted to escape from an environment he thought cruel and barbaric. He is the author of the Citizen-Advertiser‘s serial, FORBIDDEN VALLEY.”“At the age of 11,” the article continued, “he left his family’s migratory ‘chicken-wagon’ home and started out to see the world. For eighteen months he tramped about the country…“After a winter’s trapping in the Athabasca north country of Canada, he roamed the United States for another two years and then entered high school at 18.“His writing career started when he read a ‘North Woods’ story in which description and details were so inaccurate that Mowery determined he could do better himself. Editors seemed to agree and in three years he produced more than 400 published stories. He did not receive wide recognition as an author, however, until he began taking more time on stories and sharply curtailed his output.“The Mowery family, headed by the man who once wanted only ‘Civilizing Influences,’ now spends the major portion of the year in out-door activities, exploring, mountain-climbing and camping.”Mowery served in the Tank Corps during the last year of World War I.Graduating Ohio State University with a Bachelor of Arts degree, he taught English and creative writing at the universities of Illinois, of New York and of Texas.One of his students, Mary Higgins Clark [who became a bestselling mystery writer], later described Professor Mowery as “an elfin-sized man who wore a tie so long that it gave the visual illusion of scraping the tops of his shoes.”Clark added that “His talents as a teacher, however, were huge and he set my feet firmly on the path that I had been seeking all my life.”“Take a dramatic situation from real life, one that sticks in your mind,” Mowery would advise his students.  “Ask yourself two questions — ‘Suppose’ and ‘What if?’ and turn that situation into fiction.” In 1953, Thomas Y. Crowell published his PROFESSIONAL SHORT STORY WRITING: An Authoritative, Practical Guide to Basic Problems and Craftsmanship.Besides the newspapers, Mowery’s 450 short stories appeared in a number of popular American magazines. His first published work was “Be Sure He Is Green” in 10 Story Book, October, 1921.  He also appeared in Argosy All-Story Weekly, Adventure, Munsey’s Magazine, The Blue Book Magazine, Short Stories, North-West Stories, Redbook Magazine, The Country Gentleman, Complete Northwest, Liberty and The Saturday Evening Post.It was his hardcover books that brought him his fame.From 1929 to 1948, William Byron Mowery published fifteen novels and short story collections that, as a total work, may be the most literate and realistic of the Mountie genre.  His stories were set throughout the Canadian Northlands, from towns and villages to the wildest places.Like Canadian wilderness writers from Charles G. D. Roberts, Grey Owl and Ernest Thompson Seton to Farley Mowat and Candace Savage, as well as fellow American James Oliver Curwood, Mowery’s novels were published throughout northern Europe. Languages include German, Swedish, Norwegian, Hungarian, French and Spanish.Some of his best novels are:CHALLENGE OF THE NORTH  Not to be confused with Jim Hendryx’s novel of the same title, this is a romantic adventure of a Mountie’s spunky granddaughter who sets out to return stolen money.HEART OF THE NORTHPHANTOM CANOETHE BLACK AUTOMATIC (reprinted as a Popular Library paperback and retitled OUTLAW BREED)VENGEANCE TRAILTHE GIRL FROM GOD’S MERCIEPARADISE TRAILand RESURRECTION RIVER.Mowery’s THE LONG ARM OF THE MOUNTED (1948, Whittlesey House, McGraw-Hill Company, New York, Toronto) collected four of his Mountie stories: “The Mystery Of The Ghost Gold,” “Mannikin Talk,” “A Relic Of The Vikings” and “Shepherd Of The Storm.”Thomas Bouregy & Co published a new collection of Mowery’s stories in 1953, SAGAS OF THE MOUNTED POLICE, with an introduction by the author.  SAGAS brought together some of the best short Northwesterns ever written, including two stories from THE LONG ARM as well as “The Scout,” “Corporal Nat,” “The Long Shadow,” “The Constable Of Lone Sioux,” “St. Gabriel Zsbyski,” and “A Lamb And Some Slaughtering.”  Mowery called “Lamb” a “rollicking story…based on a yarn told to me by its actual participant at a reunion of NWMP veterans in Calgary years ago.”The Notes about the Author on the back cover of  SAGAS, by the way, say that Mowery taught at McGill University, Montreal — a fact I’ve been unable to verify. They also say that Mowery “shot a bear when he was eight years old but says that he couldn’t read or write until he was around fourteen.”A second edition of SAGAS, this time in paperback, appeared in 1962 from Airmont Books of New York and Ryerson Press of Toronto, under the title TALES OF THE MOUNTED POLICE."