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Lyman Frank Baum (May 15, 1856 - May 6, 1919), better known by his pen name L. Frank Baum, was an American author chiefly known for his children's books, particularly The Wonderful Wizard of Oz. He wrote thirteen novel sequels, nine other fantasy novels, and a host of other works (55 novels in total, plus four lost works, 83 short stories, over 200 poems, an unknown number of scripts, and many miscellaneous writings), and made numerous attempts to bring his works to the stage and screen. His works anticipated such century-later commonplaces as television, augmented reality, laptop computers (The Master Key), wireless telephones (Tik-Tok of Oz), women in high risk, action-heavy occupations (Mary Louise in the Country), and the ubiquity of advertising on clothing (Aunt Jane's Nieces at Work). Baum's avowed intentions with the Oz books, and other fairy tales, was to re-tell tales such as are found in the works of the Brothers Grimm and Hans Christian Andersen; make them in an American vein, update them, avoid stereotypical characters such as dwarfs or genies, and remove the association of violence and moral teachings. Although the first books contained a fair amount of violence, it decreased with the series; in The Emerald City of Oz, Ozma objected to doing violence even to the Nomes who threaten Oz with invasion. His introduction is often cited as the beginnings of the sanitization of children's stories, although he did not do a great deal more than eliminate harsh moral lessons. His stories still include decapitations, eye removals, maimings of all kinds, and other violent acts, but the tone is very different from Grimm or Andersen. Baum was born in Chittenango, New York, in 1856, into a devout Methodist family. He had German, Scots-Irish, and English ancestry, and was the seventh of nine children of Cynthia Ann (nee Stanton) and Benjamin Ward Baum, only five of whom survived into adulthood. Lyman is the name of his father's brother, but he always disliked it and preferred his middle name, Frank. On May 5, 1919, Baum suffered a stroke. The following day he slipped into a coma but briefly awoke and spoke his last words to his wife, Now we can cross the Shifting Sands. Frank died on May 6, 1919. He was buried in Glendale's Forest Lawn Memorial Park Cemetery. His final Oz book, Glinda of Oz, was published on July 10, 1920, a year after his death. Oz series continued long after his death by other authors, who wrote an additional nineteen Oz books.

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