Patricia Beatty was born in Portland, Oregon, and was a longtime resident of Southern California. After graduating from Reed College, she taught high school english and history, and later held various positions as a science and children's librarian. In 1950, she married John Louis Beatty, a history professor.

In 1953 the Beattys moved to Riverside, where John had received a position at the newly formed University of California, Riverside. Patricia worked at the Riverside Public Library as a librarian, and began writing books in her spare time. She wrote numerous books, and coauthored 10 books with John before his death in 1975. She also taught Writing Fiction for Children at several branches of the University of California in the late 1960s. Beatty married UC Riverside economics professor Carl Uhr in 1975, and passed away on July 9, 1991.

Beatty's work won numerous awards, including two Western Writers of America Awards (1984, 1987), the Scott O'Dell Award for Historical Fiction for Charley Skedaddle (1988), and two California Council Medals from the Southern California Council on Literature for Children and Young People (1974, 1976). The California Library Association also created the John and Patricia Beatty Award in 1987, to honor children's books highlighting California.