C. L. Edson

Charles Leroy Edson (September 6 or December 6, 1881 – December 4, 1975) was an American newspaper columnist, humorist, and poet whose work appeared in New York papers in the first decades of the 20th century. He wrote a guide to writing newspaper humor, The Gentle Art of Columning: A Treatise on Comic Journalism (1920), and an autobiography, The Great American Ass (1926). Edson also wrote for several national publications.

Edson's career suffered after he published his autobiography, which included an extensive personal attack on Franklin P. Adams, a New York colleague. In 1935 he joined the Federal Writers Project in Topeka, Kansas and stayed there until 1937. Thereafter, little is known about the specifics of his life, though in 1963, he was reported to be living in relative obscurity and poverty in a Topeka hotel. After the building was demolished, he resided at a nursing home in the city until his death in 1975.