He got his start as a writer writing serialized stories, most notably in The American Boy magazine.
The supporting characters in the Todd and Ott books — "Red" Meyers, "Scoop" Ellery, and "Peg" Shaw — were real boys that Lee befriended around the time he began writing the stories while living in Shelby, Ohio.
[citation needed] Edward Edson Lee is buried in Beloit, Wisconsin.
The end of each Jerry Todd book had the unusual feature of printed letters from readers and Lee's warm, informal responses to them.
Ronald Reagan wrote that, growing up in Tampico, Illinois, he had a boyhood much like Jerry Todd.