A model prisoner, willing, obedient, faithful

William Sidney Porter was released from the Ohio Penitentiary in Columbus [pictured] on July 24, 1901. Found guilty of embezzlement from the bank where he was employed in Austin, Texas, Porter had been sentenced to five years but served only three and a three months. While incarcerated, he turned to his pen to earn a little income as a writer in support of his daughter; in doing so, he chose the pseudonym O. Henry.

Friends and admirers maintained that Porter was innocent throughout the trial; Porter himself offered little one way or another. "I never had so non-communicative a client," recalled one of his lawyers. "He would tell me nothing." His reticence may have been in part due to the recent death of his wife. He had fled the country and moved to Honduras to avoid facing charges but her illness drew him back. She died almost exactly four years before his release. His release was expedited in part because of his willingness to serve as a pharmacist at the prison, earning him much respect for his hard work and commitment to his duties.

Immediately after his sentencing, Porter assured his mother-in-law that he was not guilty "of wrongdoing in that bank matter." He and others believed he should have been acquitted (though it is difficult to explain why he fled the country as an innocent man). "I naturally am crushed by the result [of the verdict]," he wrote, but he said he cared little for public opinion but wish "I would have a few of my friends still believe that there is some good in me." One employee of the prison noted that Porter did not speak of his conviction and seemed "weighed down by his imprisonment" but that he was "a model prisoner, willing, obedient, faithful."

Some of the stories by "O. Henry" were inspired by conversations with inmates and employees of the prison, allegedly including "The Ethics of Pig." In that story, later part of the collection The Gentle Grafter, the narrator Jefferson Peters chats with a man who makes his living by scamming rich people out of their money. In an innocent town called Mount Nebo, which he describes as being like the Garden of Eden, though no one had known "that Adam had been dispossessed," he sees his opportunity. The town was free of crime and immortality — with the exception of a man named Rufe Tatum, a man convicted of manslaughter who was set to be released that day. Peters sees a potential partner in crime in the man (who is best known as a hog thief) but Tatum forgets his role in their money-making plan and instead steals a pig from a circus. When Peters sees an ad for a reward for the stolen pig, he buys it off Tatum for $800. When he goes to turn in the pig, however, he learns the ad is a fake and Tatum has run off with his money. "So there, you see," said Jefferson Peters, in conclusion, "how hard it is ever to find a fair-minded and honest business-partner."

Henry on Field: he found his kingdom

O. Henry had been working for the Daily Post in Houston, Texas for only about three weeks when he heard of the death of his friend and fellow author Eugene Field. Originally, he called his column "Tales of the Town" before changing it to "Some Postscripts." Most were short, humorous vignettes. On November 6, 1895, two days after Field's death, however, he offered this poetic tribute:

No gift his genius might have had,
   Of titles high in church or State,

Could charm him as the one he bore
   Of children's poet laureate.

He smiling pressed aside the bays
   And laurel garlands that he won,

And bowed his head for baby hands
   To place a daisy wreath upon.

He found his kingdom in the ways
   Of little ones he loved so well;

For them he tuned his lyre and sang
   Sweet simple songs of magic spell.

Oh, greater feat to storm the gates
   Of children's pure and cleanly hearts,

Than to subdue a warring world
   By stratagems and doubtful arts!

So, when he laid him down to sleep
   And earthly honors seemed so poor;

Methinks he clung to little hands
   The latest, for the love they bore.

A tribute paid by chanting choirs
   And pealing organs rises high;

But soft and clear, somewhere he hears
   Through all, a child's low lullaby.

O. Henry: the rolling stone that gathered moss

"It rolled for about a year," O. Henry later recalled, "and then showed unmistakable signs of getting mossy. Moss and I never were friends, and so I said good-bye to it." He was referring to his short-lived weekly newspaper called Rolling Stone, which began publication on April 28, 1894. It ceased almost exactly one year later on April 27, 1895.

At the time of its first issue, the North Carolina-born man (still using his real name William Sidney Porter) was in Austin, Texas working at a bank. That job would end in disaster when he would be charged with stealing money. His interest in more literary pursuits led to him leaving the job to focus on Rolling Stone. His motivations were not financial. One of his co-editors, James P. Crane, later said, "It was one of the means we employed to get the pleasure out of life and never appealed to us as a money-making adventure. We did it for the fun of the thing."

After quitting his job at the bank, however, Henry soon realized he was on the road to poverty. He looked for other work (hoping his friends in Chicago could find something for him there, for example), while hoping for the best with Rolling Stone. By January 1895, it was published both in Austin and San Antonio every Saturday. It received support from humorists like Edgar Wilson Nye. When Henry started veering into politics, even with a humorous intent, scores of readers gave up on it. Regardless of its lack of financial success, however, it was his work with Rolling Stone that convinced Henry to be a writer, not a banker.

O Henry: When the cows come home

William Sidney Porter, known by the pseudonym O. Henry, turned to writing while incarcerated to raise money for his family. The majority of his works were short stories, often humorous tales. On occasion, however, he also wrote poetry.

Not all of his poems include the wit of his short prose. His poem "Looking Forward," dated November 3, 1895, is a harmless and fun poem that experiments a bit with form in its repeated phrases "when (till) the cows come home":
 

Soft shadows grow deeper in dingle and dell,
  Night hawks are beginning to roam;
The breezes are cooler; the owl is awake,
The whippoorwill calls from his nest in the brake;
When
            the
                    cows
                              come
                                        home.

The cup of the lily is heavy with dew;
  In heaven's aerial dome
Stars twinkle; and down in the darkening swamp
The fireflies glow, and the elves are a-romp;
When
            the
                    cows
                              come
                                        home.

And the populist smiles when he thinks of the time
  That unto his party will come;
When at the pie counter they capture a seat,
And they'll eat and eat and eat and eat
Till
            the
                    cows
                              come
                                        home.

The poem was published in the Houston Daily Post while Henry was employed as a columnist there. It was a role he held for less than a year.

Do something good for a whole lot of children

The Outlook for June 30, 1900 published the short story "Georgia's Ruling," written by a then-incarcerated O. Henry — whose real name was William Sydney Porter. The story focuses on a Land Survey Commissioner deciding on an important case (Henry himself had formerly work in a land surveyor's office). For generations, a tract of land belonged to a family which, over the years, became destitute and had to sell off acreage. A pair of "land-sharks" hope to acquire the land by claiming the original property was incorrectly measured.

The Commissioner, however, is a bit distracted. At the beginning of the story, O. Henry tells us the man has lost his wife and is left with a young daughter named Georgia. However, Georgia is sick. As she is dying, she tells her father:

"Papa, I wish I could do something good for a whole lot of children... I mean poor children who haven't homes, and aren't loved and cared for as I am.... If I shouldn't get well, I'll leave them you — not give you, but just lend you, for you must come to mamma and me when you die too. If you can find time, wouldn't you do something to help them, if I ask you, papa?"

In pursuing the case, the Commissioner realizes the land in question is idyllic, but populated with many families, including "flocks" of children — all of whom would be left homeless if the ruling is in favor of the land-sharks.

In completing his research before making his judgment, the Commissioner visits the cartographer who is working on a new map of the area. The shape of the river has changed since his last map and the Commissioner wants to see it. The cartographer seems embarrassed before handing over the map: the river and the landscape form the outline of Georgia's face. The Commissioner turned the land-sharks away, saving the land for its occupants. Like the Commissioner had promised his daughter, he had done "something good for the children," and his decision was nicknamed "Georgia's Ruling."

The curse of the world, for its theme

After being accused of stealing funds while working at a bank in Austin, Texas, William Sidney Porter fled to New Orleans and, later, Honduras. When he heard his wife Athol Estes was sick and dying back home, he returned and stood trial. Though he denied it, he was found guilty. He was allowed to remain free until his wife's death and, on April 25, 1898, was imprisoned. His sentence was for five years; he was released after three years and three months for good behavior.

Concerned over the well-being of his daughter, Porter focused on writing stories while in jail. He had published here and there earlier but he was worried that his status as an inmate would hurt his reputation. After experimenting with various pseudonyms, he settled on O. Henry. He soon became one of the most popular short story writers in the United States, with over 200 to his name (most published in the ten years before his death).

The first story to carry the now-famous pen name was "Whistling Dick's Christmas Stocking," published in McClure's Magazine. When the title character wakes up on Christmas morning, the sound of workers around him reminds him of jail:

Already from the bosom of the mill came the thunder of rolling barrels of sugar, and (prison-like sounds) there was a great rattling of chains as the mules were harried with stimulant imprecations to their places by the wagon-tongues. A little vicious "dummy" engine, with a train of flat cars in tow, stewed and fumed on the plantation tap of the narrow-gauge railroad, and a toiling, hurrying, hallooing stream of workers were dimly seen in the half darkness loading the train with the weekly output of sugar. Here was a poem, an epic — nay, a tragedy — with work, the curse of the world, for its theme.

O Henry: twaddle about himself

He was born William Sydney Porter in Greensboro, North Carolina on September 11, 1862. Years later, he was coy about the year of his birth, saying nothing more specific than "about the close of the war." He was equally coy about his name; literary history would remember him as "O. Henry."

Porter kept his true identity a secret on purpose: he asked that his photo never be circulated and provided little information about his personal life. "Nobody but a concentrated idiot would write over a pen-name and then tack on a lot of twaddle about himself," he wrote. As such, the true "O. Henry" was a bit mystifying. He once refused to tell an admirer whether he was male or female.

Regardless, his work was popular and highly approved of by many readers, including his short story "The Gift of the Magi." Some in his lifetime were calling "O. Henry" a classic author, "one of the great masters of modern literature," and the greatest of American writers. But, he came from humble beginnings. In his own words:

I was born and raised in "No'th Ca'llina" and at eighteen went to Texas and ran wild on the prairies. Wild yet, but not so wild. Can't get to loving New Yorkers. Live all alone in a great big two rooms on quiet old Irving Place three doors from Wash. Irving's old home. Kind of lonesome. Was thinking lately (since the April moon commenced to shine) how I'd like to be down South... and sit down on the porch — not on a chair — on the edge of the porch, and lay my straw hat on the steps and lay my head back against the honeysuckle on the post — and just talk.

After a time in Texas, O. Henry's most prolific period was spent in New York, where he wrote most of his notable short stories (including "The Gift of the Magi"). Even so, he often fondly recalled North Carolina, the state of his birth and boyhood. It was there that he was buried after his death in 1910. He was 47.

Death of Stephen Crane and O. Henry

Stephen Crane ended the 19th century with a severe hemorrhage of the lungs, shortly after hosting a several day-long Christmas banquet. He recovered somewhat but, amidst writing a novel called The O'Ruddy, he suffered two more massive hemorrhages in the spring of 1900. He went to a health spa in Germany, still dictating a few chapters for his novel. He died on June 5, 1900. He was 28 years old.

The O'Ruddy was published posthumously in 1903. Despite his youth, before his death Crane had already published Maggie: A Girl of the Streets, The Red Badge of Courage, and The Open Boat and Other Tales of Adventure (among other works). Even so, he was not quite as prolific as O. Henry, who died the same day, ten years later, on June 5, 1910. Henry was 47.

Henry, whose real name was William Sidney Porter, wrote mostly short stories, often upbeat, usually with a surprise ending. One of his most famous is "The Gift of the Magi." The story follows a poor couple searching for the perfect gift for their spouse. The wife buys a fob for her husband's prized watch, selling her beautiful hair for money to make the purchase. Unbeknown to her, the husband has sold his watch to buy an extravagant set of combs for his wife's long hair. Henry compares this couple to the Biblical magi:

And here I have lamely related to you the uneventful chronicle of two foolish children in a flat who most unwisely sacrificed for each other the greatest treasures of their house. But in a last word to the wise of these days let it be said that of all who give gifts these two were the wisest. Of all who give and receive gifts, such as they are wisest. Everywhere they are wisest. They are the magi.