Jeffery Farnol - The Broad Highway: The Bestseller of 1911

John Jeffery Farnol was born on 10th February 1878 in Aston, Birmingham, England. Farnol’s childhood years were spent in London and Kent. After losing his job with a Birmingham metal-working company he returned to London and enrolled in the Westminster School of Art.

In 1900, he married Blanche Wilhelmina Victoria Hawley. She was only 16 and the daughter of the noted New York scenic artist H. Hughson Hawley. The couple decided to live in the United States, and Farnol found work as a scene painter. They had one daughter.

Obviously, life as a scene-painter was low-key and Farnol had writing talent. He published his first novel ‘My Lady Caprice’ in 1907. This moderate success was followed by ‘The Broad Highway’, a publishing sensation, which became the best-selling book of 1911.

Over his career he wrote some 40 novels and volumes of short stories together with some non-fiction and children’s books. Primarily he is known as a romantic writer of Georgian Era or English Regency.

In 1938 Farnol divorced, and married Phyllis Mary Clarke and adopted her daughter, Charmian Jane.

Jeffery Farnol died aged 73 on 9th August 1952 in Eastbourne, UK, after a long struggle with cancer.