Finn, Francis J.

Father Francis J. Finn was born to Irish immigrant parents at St. Louis, Missouri in 1859. He loved to read Charles Dickens works as a boy, including The Pickwick Papers, and eventually became a priest thanks to the influence of Father Charles Coppens. After graduating from St. Louis University, he became a Jesuit and was ordained a priest in 1893. He had already begun writing his debut novel Tom Playfair prior to this, as he was assigned to St. Mary s College in Kansas and dealt with unruly boys on a daily basis. He went on to write twenty-seven other books, and his novels for children were v...