The Young Outlaw

Horatio Alger, Jr. (1832-1899) was a prolific 19th-century American author, best known for his many juvenile novels about impoverished boys and their rise from humble backgrounds to lives of middle-class security and comfort through hard work, determination, courage, and honesty, starting with Ragged Dick in 1868.

In the last decades of the 19th century, Alger’s moral tone coarsened, and violence, murder, and other sensational themes entered his works.