David H. Keller - Biography

Biography

Keller was born in Philadelphia and graduated from the School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania in 1903. He served as a neuropsychiatrist in the U.S. Army Medical Corps during World Wars I and II, and was the Assistant Superintendent of the Louisiana State Mental Hospital at Pineville until Huey Long's reforms removed him from his position in 1928.

That same year, Keller would travel to New York City to meet with Hugo Gernsback, publisher of Amazing Stories, who had bought his first professionally published science fiction story, "The Revolt of the Pedestrians". Gernsback was impressed by Keller's quality of writing, unique insight, and ability to address sophisticated themes beyond the commonplace technological predictions or lurid alien encounters typically found in early pulp stories. He encouraged Keller's writing and would later call these distinctive short stories "Keller yarns".

In 1929, Gernsback founded the magazine Science Wonder Stories and not only published Keller's work in the first issue, but listed him as an Associate Science Editor. It was this issue of Science Wonder Stories that introduced the term "science fiction" to the world. This began an intense writing period for Keller, but he was unable to support his family solely on a writer's income and set up a small private psychiatric practice out of his home in Stroudsburg, Pennsylvania.