Theodore Goodridge Roberts

1877-1953

George Edward Theodore Goodridge “T.G.” Roberts (poet, novelist, and journalist) was born 7 July 1877 in the rectory of St. Anne’s Parish in Fredericton, NB.  Roberts attended the Fredericton Collegiate School and attended as an undergraduate at the University of New Brunswick (UNB) but left before completing his degree.  He published his first poem at the age of eleven (in 1889) in The Independent, a New York weekly and published his first non-fiction piece in Century magazine in June 1891. In the summer of 1897, Roberts moved to New York City and took a position as sub-editor at The Independent. Roberts was sent as a special correspondent to Tampa, Florida, in May 1898 to cover the Spanish-American war. Roberts contracted malaria aboard ship on the way to Cuba and returned to Fredericton. After a one-year convalescence at home, Roberts travelled to Newfoundland and stayed for more than three years, during which time he helped found and edit The Newfoundland Magazine and published Northland Lyrics (1899), his first poetry collection, and The House of Isstens (1900). His novel The Wasp was published in 1914. Roberts averaged three novels a year from 1908 until 1914, at which time he enlisted in the army. In the summer of 1915, he was commissioned as a Lieutenant in the 12th Battalion. Roberts wrote official reports and battlefield accounts and published three works in collaboration with others: Patrols and Trench Raids (1916), Battalion Histories (1918), and Thirty Canadian V.C.’s (1918). He published thirty-four novels and more than one hundred poems and short stories in periodicals such as Acadie, Blackwood’s Magazine, Canadian Author and Bookman, Century, Esquire, Maclean’s, National Monthly, Saturday Night, and Scribner’s. Books he include The Leather Bottle (1934), Captain Love (1908); Hemming the Adventurer (1904) and The Fighting Starkleys (1922), The Harbor Master (1913). In 1930 received a Doctor of Literature from UNB in recognition of his contribution to Canadian letters; he was elected to the Royal Society of Canada four years after that. He died 24 February 1953 in Digby, NS, and is buried in Forest Hill Cemetery, Fredericton, NB.

Predominant New Brunswick Residences:

Fredericton

Archival Material

• Theodore Goodridge Roberts and family fonds
  ⌄
  Location

  University of New Brunswick Archives & Special Collections

  Website/Catalogue Record

  View Archival Record

  Retrieval Number

  MG L 12

  Date Range of Material

  1852 - [19--?], predominant 1906 - [19--?]

  Extent

  57 cm textual records

  Scope and Content Note

  This fonds documents the literary career of Theodore Goodridge Roberts, and reflects his business dealings with publishers and editors and his service in the Canadian army during the First World War. The fonds also contains 10 documents relating to the professional activities of Canon George Goodridge Roberts, the patriarch of the Roberts family, as well as a holograph poem by his son Goodridge Bliss Roberts, who died prematurely. It includes business and personal correspondence, literary notebooks, a literary agreement, copies of lecture notes on literary subjects, lecture programmes and holograph, typescript and published copies of poems and short stories. It also includes newspaper clippings and biographical information about Theodore Goodridge Roberts and other members of the Roberts family.