Richard Edward Wormser was an American writer of pulp fiction, detective fiction, screenplays, and Westerns, some of it written using the pseudonym of Ed Friend. He is estimated to have written 300 short stories, 200 novelettes, 12 books, many screenplays and stories turned into screenplays and a cookbook Southwest Cookery or At Home on the Range. After graduating from Princeton University he became a prolific writer of pulp fiction under his own name, the pen name of Conrad Gerson, and wrote seventeen Nick Carter novels for Street & Smith. Wormser's first crime fiction novel was The Man with the Wax Face in 1934. His first Western novel was The Lonesome Quarter in 1951. During World War II he served as a forest ranger. Wormser won Western Spur Awards for juvenile fiction for Ride a Northbound Horse in 1964, and for The Black Mustanger in 1971. He also won an Edgar award for best original paperback novel for The Invader in 1973.