[mezentius]

Absolutely. Chandler was in fact employed by an oil company before he tapped a richer vein (sorry) with his fiction.

Incidentally, while re-reading Chandler's "The Lady in the Lake," I realized that the scene in which Marlowe meets his employer, dozing off in a "high-backed chair" in his club's library, was a description of the library at the Los Angeles Athletic Club. Today, if you're a member (or know one), you can pop up to the third floor, still preserved in all of its interwar ersatz-Gilded-Age splendor, and doze off in one of those distinctive high-backed chairs after a drink and schvitz.

It turns out that Chandler had worked across the street when employed by Dabney Oil, and visited the L.A. Athletic Club frequently.

[keiferski]

Ah you’re right, I’ve read a few biographies of Chandler but somehow totally forgot he worked for an oil company. IIRC it was a job he got through his father in law.

Great trivia about the club - will definitely have to visit that if I make it to LA again.