E.J. Rath is the pseudonym of writer Edith Rathbone Jacobs Brainerd (1885 – January 28, 1922) who was assisted with many of her writing projects by her husband Chauncey Corey Brainerd (April 16, 1874 – January 28, 1922), a Washington D.C. correspondent for the Brooklyn Daily Eagle. Several of her stories were adapted into plays and films.
Brainerd was her second husband. They married June 4, 1903.[2]
The story "The Heroism of Mr. Peglow" was published in Everybody's Magazine in December 1907.[3]
The couple were killed along with almost 100 others when the roof of the Knickerbocker Theatre in Washington D.C. collapsed under the weight of heavy snow. The event became known as the Knickerbocker Storm and occurred January 27–28, 1922. Politicians, officials, and fellow newspaper reporters paid tribute. He had attended the Peace Conference in Europe.
The Brooklyn Daily Eagle published a 36-page tribute.[4]
Merrily We Live (1938), based on the 1924 novel The Dark Chapter: A Comedy of Class Distinctions by E.J. Rath and the 1926 Broadway adaptation They All Want Something