Background
Paul Armstrong was born on April 25, 1869 in Kidder, Missouri, United States, the son of Richard and Harriet (Scott) Armstrong. His parents then moved to Bay City, Michigan, where his father engaged in the steamship business.
Paul Armstrong was born on April 25, 1869 in Kidder, Missouri, United States, the son of Richard and Harriet (Scott) Armstrong. His parents then moved to Bay City, Michigan, where his father engaged in the steamship business.
In Bay City Armstrong began and ended his education by attending public schools.
At twenty-one, he secured a license to be master of steam-vessels and for a short time was purser on a steamer plying between Chicago and St. Joseph, Mich. Numerous short stories which he wrote were uniformly rejected by the publishers, but, undiscouraged, he decided to enter literature by the back-door of journalism.
He went to Buffalo and wrote for the Express, the Courier, and the News until 1896, one of his first assignments on the Express being a murder mystery which he unexpectedly helped to solve. He next worked for two years on the Chicago Times-Herald and the Inter-Ocean, after which he moved to New York and under the pen-name of "Right Cross" wrote on sports and pugilism for several New York newspapers. Meanwhile he had become interested in writing for the theatre.
His first play, Just a Day Dream, was favorably read in manuscript by Joseph Jefferson and was produced by a Boston stock company, but Armstrong tried in vain to interest any New York manager in it. Three later plays, The Superstition of Sue, St. Ann, and the first version of Society and the Bull Dog were staged about 1904 without success. The reward of perseverance came, however, in 1905, with the triumphant production of The Heir to the Hoorah.
For the next eight years Armstrong was one of the most popular of American playwrights, and his fecundity under the stimulus of success was remarkable. There appeared from his pen: Ann Lamont (1905), a revision of St. Ann; In a Blaze of Glory (1906), one act; Salomy Jane (1907), adapted from Bret Harte's story, "Salomy Jane's Kiss"; Society and the Bull Dog (1908), revised version; Going Some (1908), farce written in collaboration with Rex Beach; Via Wireless (1908), melodrama in collaboration with Winchell Smith; Blue Grass (1908), revision of an early curtain-raiser; The Renegade (1909); For a Woman (1909); Alias Jimmy Valentine (1909), written in a single week, and his most successful work, prompting a long series of imitative "crook plays" by others; The Deep Purple (1910), pseudo-scientific mystery play, in collaboration with Wilson Mizner; A Romance of the Underworld (1911), revision of For a Woman; The Greyhound (1912), in collaboration with Wilson Mizner; The Escape (1912); A Love Story (1913); Woman Proposes (1913), vaudeville sketch; To Save One Girl (1913), vaudeville sketch. About 1913 Armstrong's health began to fail and his work to lose its grip.
The Bludgeon (1914) and The Heart of a Thief (1914) were less successful than their predecessors. Mr. Lorelei, a folk-comedy, was merely published posthumously in Smart Set, January 1916. Armstrong died from heart-failure at his home in New York City on August 30, 1915. His plays were ephemeral, written solely for the stage with slight regard for literary merit.
He was an effective story-teller, adept in producing crisp, pungent dialogue, with grim humor and strong climaxes.
Armstrong was twice married. His first wife was Rella Abell, of Kansas City, whom he married in London, July 24, 1899.
On December 10, 1913 Mrs. Armstrong secured a divorce with alimony for herself and her three daughters, and on December 12, 1913 Armstrong married Catherine Calvert of Baltimore, who had starred in several of his plays and who later became a prominent moving-picture actress. They had one son.