Cyrus Fisher

Cyrus Fisher was the pen name of Darwin L. Teilhet (1904–1964), the grandson of a French immigrant who came to America from Saint-Chamant, in the Corrèze region of France, after the Great French Wine Blight of 1860. Born in Wyanet, Illinois, Teilhet made several trips to his family’s ancestral land as a boy, and as a teenager he even worked as a juggler in a French circus.

Teilhet was born one year after the Wright brothers’ first successful flight. In those early decades of air travel, the marvel of human flight captivated the world and became the obsession of many. Having learned to fly while he was still in high school, Teilhet retuned to Saint-Chamant in 1924 to build a huge glider. The day the twenty-one-year-old successfully flew the glider was declared a legal holiday by the town’s mayor.

Teilhet is also the author of many detective novels for adults, the majority of which he wrote in conjunction with his wife, Hildegarde. He passed away in Palo Alto, California.