ABSTRACT
Robert J. Burdette was born in Greensboro, Pennsylvania on July 30, 1844, the second of ten children in the family of Frederick and Sophia Burdette. In 1862 Burdette enlisted with the 47th Illinois regiment. Burdette married Carrie Garrett on March 4, 1870. She was an invalid at the time and never recovered though she was able to bear a son, Robert Jr., in 1877. Burdette's first newspaper job was with the Peoria Daily Transcript. Burdette was a gifted extemporaneous speaker, so in response to the national attention he was receiving he turned to public speaking. Burdette also served as a City Commissioner in Pasadena and divided his last years among travel, church activities, and occasional writing projects for the Los Angeles Times Magazine. Burdette liked to refer to himself as an author of "humorous philosophy", by which term he meant light entertainment that, while far from didactic, always had a clear moral purpose.
