Lewis began as a
staff writer at the
Chicago Times, and eventually became editor of the
Chicago Times-Herald. In 1901 he published a biography of
Richard Croker (1843–1922), a leading figure in the corrupt
political machine known as
Tammany Hall, which exercised a great deal of control over New York politics from the 1790s to the 1960s. As a writer of
genre fiction, his most successful works were
Westerns from his
Wolfville series, which he continued writing until he died of
gastrointestinal disease at his home in Manhattan on December 23, 1914. ==Bibliography==