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Arthur Conan Doyle was a British writer of Irish descent, considered a major figure in crime fiction. His most famous series of works consisted of the "Sherlock Holmes" stories (1887-1927), consisting of four novels and 56 short stories. His other notable series were the "Professor Challenger" stories (1912-1929) about a scientist and explorer, and the "Brigadier Gerard" stories (1894-1910) about a French soldier in the Napoleonic Wars. Doyle's literary works have frequently been adapted into film and television.
In 1859, Doyle was born in Edinburgh, Scotland to an Irish Catholic family. His father was Charles Altamont Doyle (1832 - 1893), a professional illustrator and water-colorist who is primarily remembered for fantasy-style paintings. Doyle's mother was Mary Foley (1837-1920). Through his father, Doyle was a nephew of the antiquarian James William Edmund Doyle (1822 - 1892), the illustrator Richard Doyle (1824-1883), and the gallery director Henry Edward Doyle (1827 -1893). Doyle's paternal grandfather was the political cartoonist and caricaturist John Doyle (1797-1868).
During his early years, Doyle's family had financial problems due to his father's struggles with depression and alcoholism. They received financial support from affluent uncles, who also financed Doyle's education. From 1868 to 1870, Doyle was educated at Hodder Place, a Jesuit preparatory school located at Stonyhurst, Lancashire. From 1870 to 1875, Doyle attended Stonyhurst College, a Roman Catholic boarding school. He disliked the school due to its rather limited curriculum, and the constant threats of corporal punishment and ritual humiliation used to discipline students.
From 1875 to 1876, Doyle received further education at Stella Matutina, a Jesuit school located at Feldkirch, Austria. His family wanted him to perfect his use of the German language, but this school offered a wider range of study subjects. Stella Matutina attracted student from many countries, and was more cosmopolitan in nature than Doyle's previous schools.
Doyle decided to follow a medical career. From 1876 to 1881, Doyle studied medicine at the University of Edinburgh Medical School. He also took botany lessons at the Royal Botanic Garden in Edinburgh. During his university years, Doyle started writing short stories. He had trouble finding a publisher, and "Blackwood's Magazine" (1817-1980) rejected his submitted work. Doyle's first published short story was "The Mystery of Sasassa Valley" (1879), featuring a demon in South Africa. That same year, Doyle published his first academic article in a science journal. The article examined the uses of the flowering plant Gelsemium as a poison. As an experiment, Doyle self-administrated doses of the poison and recorded the symptoms.
In 1880, Doyle worked for a while as a doctor in the whaling ship "Hope". In 1881, following his graduation from medical school, Doyle served as a ship's surgeon on the SS Mayumba. In 1882, Doyle and a former classmate established a medical practice in Plymouth, Devon. Their partnership failed, and Doyle soon started his own practice in Southsea, Hampshire. He did not have many patients, so he decided to resume writing fiction to supplement his income.
In 1886, Doyle created the character of Sherlock Holmes. He loosely based his creation on his former college teacher Joseph Bell (1837 - 1911), inspired by Bell's emphasis on the importance of "deduction and inference and observation". Doyle completed the first Holmes novel, "A Study in Scarlet" (1887), and sold the rights to the publishing house "Ward, Lock & Co." (1854-1964). The novel's publication was delayed until November, 1887, but it was well-received by professional critics.
Doyle next completed the sequel novel "The Sign of the Four" (1890), commissioned from the American literary magazine Lippincott's Monthly Magazine (1868-1915). He started writing short stories about Holmes for the British literary magazine "The Strand Magazine" (1891-1950).
Besides Holmes stories, Doyle wrote seven historical novels between 1888 and 1906. He wrote "Micah Clarke" (1889), as a fictionalized account of the Monmouth Rebellion (1685) and its consequences. The novel also voices Doyle's arguments against religious extremism. He wrote "The White Company" (1891) to examine the role of mercenaries in 14th-century warfare, depicting the campaigns of Edward the Black Prince (1330-1376) in the Kingdom of Castile. He wrote "The Great Shadow" (1892) to feature the experiences of soldiers in the Battle of Waterloo (1815). He wrote "The Refugees" (1893) to examine the fates of Huguenot refugees who were fleeing 17th-century France to escape religious persecution by Louis XIV (1638-1715, reigned 1643-1715). He wrote "Sir Nigel" (1906) to examine the early phases of the Hundred Years' War (1337 - 1453). He regarded these novels to be his best literary work, though they were never as popular as his crime novels.
In 1900, Doyle served as a volunteer doctor in the Second Boer War in South Africa (1899-1902), though he had no previous military experience. He was stationed at a field hospital at Bloemfontein. At about this time, Doyle wrote the non-fiction book "The Great Boer War" (1900), which covered in detail the early phases of the war. He also wrote the companion work "The War in South Africa: Its Cause and Conduct" in order to defend the British Empire from accusations of misconduct in its military efforts. These works were translated in multiple languages, and were appreciated by the British government. For his services to the British Empire, Doyle was knighted in 1902. In 1903, Doyle became a knight of the Order of Saint John, a British royal order of chivalry that was based on the original Knights Hospitaller.
In 1906, Doyle was involved in efforts to exonerate the lawyer George Edalji, a mild-mannered man who had been convicted of animal mutilations on insufficient evidence. Doyle helped publicize other instances of miscarriages of justice, and convinced the public that there was need of reforms in the legal system. In 1907, British authorities reacted to this campaign by establishing the Court of Criminal Appeal.
In 1909, Doyle wrote the non-fiction work "The Crime of the Congo" (1909). In the book, Doyle denounced the human rights abuses in the Congo Free State, and claimed that the Belgian colonial forces had enslaved the local population. He quoted testimonies from many witnesses and tried to convince the public of a need to intervene in the area.
World War I (1914-1918) was a difficult time for Doyle , as several of his relatives and friends died due to the war. Doyle's son Kingsley was seriously wounded in the Battle of the Somme (1916), and never fully recovered. Kingsley died of pneumonia in 1918, while still hospitalized. Doyle's brother, Brigadier-general Innes Doyle, died of pneumonia in 1919. Doyle's brother-in-law, the famous author E. W. Hornung, died of pneumonia in 1921. The series of deaths led Doyle to further embrace Spiritualism, and that faith's claims about existence beyond the grave. He spend much of the 1920s as a missionary of Spiritualism, and investigated supposed supernatural phenomena. He also wrote many non-fiction spiritualist works. In 1926, Doyle financed the construction of a Spiritualist Temple in Camden, London.
In July 1930, Doyle suffered a heart attack while staying in his then-residence, Windlesham Manor, in Crowborough, Sussex. He spend his last moments in reassuring his wife Jean Leckie that she was wonderful. He was 71-years-old at the time of his death. He was survived by two sons and two daughters. His daughter Jean Conan Doyle (1912 - 1997) was the copyright holder of much of her father's works until her own death.
Since Doyle was no longer a Christian at the time of his death, his family declined giving him a Christian burial place. Doyle was buried in Windlesham Manor's rose garden. His remains were later re-interred in Minstead churchyard, New Forest, Hampshire. His wife's remains were buried beside him. His gravestone epitaph described him as "Steel true/Blade straight/Arthur Conan Doyle/Knight/Patriot, Physician and man of letters".
Doyle is long gone, but his works have remained popular into the 21st century. Doyle has been cited as an influence on later crime writers, and Agatha Christie's earliest novels were strongly influenced by Sherlock Holmes' stories. His life's events have inspired several biographies, and a number of fictionalized accounts.- Soundtrack
Mildred J. Hill was born on 27 June 1859 in Louisville, Kentucky, USA. Mildred J. died on 5 June 1916 in Chicago, Illinois, USA.- Kaiser William II was born on January 27, 1859 to a Prince and Princess of Prussia. His mother was the daughter of Queen Victoria. He grew up like any Prussian Prince, except for an arm that was deformed from birth. He admired his grandparents who became Kaiser and Empress when he was small. He also admired his English Grandmother Queen Victoria as well as Otto von Bismarck. During his formative years he had to deal with having brothers and sisters. His brother Henry even got married to their cousin Irene (their Aunt Alice's daughter). Because of the attention his parents gave to his arm he grew to detest them.
When William was in his late teens he fell in love with his cousin (the daughter of his Aunt Alice) but she did not love him and got married to Grand Duke Serge of Russia. A few years later he got married to a granddaughter of his grandmother's half-sister. They had several children. In 1888 when his father died he raided his desk to find anything that may have incriminated his father in something, but all that was found was papers about how bad he had been in his life. He was with his grandmother Queen Victoria when she died in 1901. Later that year he lost his mother as well. He did the same thing to his mother that he did with his father with the same results. Vickie had given all her papers to the British ambassador to Berlin a few days before she died.
After his mother died he continued to rule Germany in a back handed manner, and did not like the fact that his Uncle Edward was more powerful than he was. He did not like the fact that he was part of starting World War One because it pitted him against cousins, aunts, and uncles all over Europe and the Americas. His response to his cousin changing their last name to Windsor was that he would like to see the Merry Wives of Saxe-Coburg & Gotha. After the war he had to give up his throne and he went to the Netherlands, where after the death of his first wife he married a second. He stayed married to his second wife till he died at the age of 82 in 1941. - American character actor of silent films, Edward Connelly, a native New Yorker, was a newspaperman before he became an actor, being a reporter for the New York Sunl. At 25 he joined a theatrical stock company in Kansas City and appeared subsequently on Broadway in such plays as "Shore Acres," "The Belle of New York," "Babbitt," "The Wild Duck," and his own production of "Marse Covington," which he later filmed (Marse Covington (1915)). Moving to Hollywood, he became a contract player at MGM, where he remained until his death from influenza in 1928.
- Josephine Crowell was a Canadian-born character actress. She appeared in vaudeville as early as 1879. On screen, she is best remembered for her dramatic portrayal of the mother in D.W. Griffith's The Birth of a Nation (1915), her comedic performances in Harold Lloyd's Speedy (1928) and Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy's Wrong Again (1929). She also played a succession of queens and princesses in such films as Main Street (1923), Mantrap (1926), The King of Kings (1927) and The Man Who Laughs (1928).
- Norwegian novelist Knut Hamsun was born to a poor family and sent to live with an uncle, a commercial fisherman. He grew up without any formal schooling. Hamsun left Norway for the U.S. twice: once in 1882, and again in 1886. Each time he stayed in the U.S. for two years, holding various jobs including farmhand and Chicago streetcar conductor. He was often poverty-stricken. His first novel "Hunger" is autobiographical and about poverty, alienation, and desperation, and, innovatively: consciousness and intense inner states. He returned to Norway and wrote several more novels, all well-received, original, and successful. He won the Nobel Prize in 1920 for "Growth of the Soil," but gradually became reclusive due to his need to write combined with and his cranky temperament. Norwegians were dismayed when in the 1930's he expressed his support for Hitler. Although he claimed his sentiments were more anti-British than pro-German, he spoke in favor of National Socialism and was vilified in Norway. His rocky relations with his children and second wife are the subject of Hamsun (1996). In 1948, he was briefly imprisoned, and his assets were seized by the state. He died penniless in 1952. Hamsun was rehabilitated posthumously, and is again considered one of the great modern Scandinavian novelists.
- Actor
- Soundtrack
Gus Leonard was born on 4 February 1859 in Marseille, Bouches-du-Rhône, France. He was an actor, known for Wurra-Wurra (1916), Her Reputation (1923) and The Girl I Loved (1923). He died on 27 March 1939 in Los Angeles, California, USA.- Kenneth Grahame was born on 8 March 1859 and was orphaned by the time he was five years old. He went to live with his grandmother in Cookham Dene, Berkshire. He attended St. Edward's School there, and at the age of 17 began working as a clerk for the Bank of England. He stayed on, was promoted several times, eventually holding the position of Permanent Secretary. He married Elspeth Thomson in 1899. Grahame wrote essays which were published in the 'National Observer,' and many well-received sketches of childhood - some about orphaned siblings - for various publications. He was nostalgic, appreciative of nature, and sensitive to the lives of children; some of the stories which comprise The Wind in the Willows were originally written as letters, others were invented as bedtime stories - all in order to amuse his young son, who died in an accident in 1920. Grahame died in 1932.
- Billy the Kid was born on 23 November 1859 in New York City, New York, USA. He died on 14 July 1881 in Fort Sumner, New Mexico Territory.
- Elias Disney was born on 6 February 1859 in Bluevale, Ontario, Canada. He was married to Flora Disney. He died on 13 September 1941 in Hollywood, California, USA.
- Walt Whitman was born on 25 April 1859 in Lyon, New York, USA. He was an actor, known for The Three Musketeers (1921), The Mark of Zorro (1920) and The Three Musketeers (1916). He was married to Miriam Shelby. He died on 27 March 1928 in Santa Monica, California, USA.
- Marshall P. Wilder was born on 19 September 1859 in Geneva, New York, USA. He was an actor and writer, known for The Widow's Might (1913), Professor Optimo (1912) and Marshall P. Wilder (1897). He was married to Mrs. Marshall P. Wilder. He died on 10 January 1915 in St. Paul, Minnesota, USA.
- Actor
Sam Marx was born on 23 October 1859 in Alsace, France. He was an actor. He was married to Miene Schönberg. He died on 10 May 1933 in Los Angeles, California, USA.- Edwin B. Tilton was born on 15 September 1859 in Chicago, Illinois, USA. He was an actor and writer, known for The Midnight Express (1924), Just Pals (1920) and The Web of Chance (1919). He was married to Edith Othellia Fasset and Irene Gaunt (actress). He died on 16 January 1926 in Hollywood, California, USA.
- Sholom Aleichem (translated from Hebrew as a greeting "Peace be with you") was the pseudonym of Sholom Yakov Rabinovitz. He was born on February 18, 1859, in Pereyaslav near Kiev, Ukraine, in the Russian Empire. His father was a religious scholar and the family was trilingual. After his mother died of cholera, when he was only 12 years of age, his father encouraged his writing, even through the hard times. Young Sholom Aleichem attended a Russian secular high school, but never attended university. He was drafted into the Russian Army and upon being discharged became a rabineer for 3 years. Throughout his entire lifetime, he was not wealthy. He had a humble, modest disposition, a quiet voice, and was described by many as a man of great wisdom and wit. It was the humbling experience of his life in Russia under the Czars that led to his special style of "laughing through tears" humor.
Sholom Aleichem began serious writing in the 1880's. He was instrumental in the foundation of "di Yidishe folks bibliotek" (the popular Yiddish library) in 1888. At the same time during the 1880's Jews in Russia came under attack (known as "pogrom"); they suffered loss of property and of lives. In 1905 Sholom Aleichem fled from Russia. He lived in several countries of Europe until WWI. Large numbers of Jews were dislocated because their communities, known as "shetls, were destroyed. With the suffering came an increased cultural awakening of Jews, expressed in literature written in Yiddish. Yiddish was the every day language of European Jews, derived from Hogh German with enrichment from Hebrew, Russian, Polish, and English (among other languages). Sholom Aleichem wrote in Yiddish, Hebrew, and Russian; he was also fluent in Polish, Ukrainian and other languages.
From 1883 to 1916, Sholom Aleichem wrote about 40 volumes of stories, novels, and plays ; he became the leading writer in Yiddish, and one of the most prolific writers ever. He also wrote scholarly works in Hebrew and secular works in Russian, the only acceptable language of official publishers in the Russian Empire. His works about the life of Jews in traditional communities were based on real life stories and were published throughout Europe and in the United States. His best known work is "Tevye the Milkman" ("Tevye der milkhiker" in Yiddish). It describes the Russian Jewish milkman, who deals with the complex world with humor, pain, optimism, and wisdom. It was adapted for stage production as the play 'Fiddler on the Roof' which became a Broadway success. The eponymous film, starring 'Haim Topol', won three Oscars. A successful staging of the 'Fiddler on the Roof' was done at the Moscow Lenkom Theatre by director Mark Zakharov, starring Evgeniy Leonov and later Vladimir Steklov in the title role.
The dangers of WWI forced Sholom Aleichem to emigrate to America. He settled in the Bronx. The tragedy of separation from his son Misha, who suffered from tuberculosis, was unbearable. After Misha's death in 1915, Sholom Aleichem followed him on May 13, 1916 in Bronx. His funeral was attended by tens of thousands.
The great value of his works is in the meticulous literary preservation of the traditional life of a shtetl, before it disappeared in the tragic abyss of history. "You can take a Jew out of a shtetl, but you cannot take a shtetl out of a Jew", wrote Sholom Aleichem. - Peter Lang was born on 29 May 1859 in Boston, Massachusetts, USA. He was an actor, known for The College Widow (1915), A Lady of Quality (1913) and The Auction Block (1917). He was married to Florence G. Lang. He died on 20 August 1932 in New York City, New York, USA.
- Mariya Blyumental-Tamarina was born on 16 July 1859 in St. Petersburg, Russian Empire [now Russia]. She was an actress, known for Don Diego i Pelageya (1928), Doch rodiny (1937) and A Greater Promise (1936). She died on 16 October 1938 in Moscow, RSFSR, USSR [now Russia].
- Born in Walsall, Staffordshire, in 1859, son of an unsuccessful ironmonger. Raised in London, and educated at Marylebone Grammar School. Started work as railway clerk at fourteen, and later worked as schoolmaster, actor and journalist. Two volumes of humorous essays preceded "Three Men In A Boat" (1889), which saw immediate and enormous success. This enabled him to become one of the founders of the humorous magazine "The Idler", which featured work by Bret Harte and Mark Twain, amongst others. Wrote a number of plays in a similar style to his friend J.M. Barrie. The most memorable of these is probably "The Passing Of The Third Floor Back".
- Robert Bolder was born on 20 July 1859 in London, England, UK. He was an actor, known for Fools for Luck (1917), Grumpy (1930) and On Trial (1917). He died on 10 December 1937 in Beverly Hills, California, USA.
- Born into a wealthy cattle-ranching family, Venustiano Carranza followed in his father's footsteps and joined the Mexican army. He became a supporter of Francisco I. Madero in Madero's efforts to overthrow the corrupt dictatorship of Gen. Porfirio Díaz. When this proved successful, Madero appointed Carranza as Secretary of War and Secretary of the Navy. However, soon after assuming power Madero was assassinated in a coup masterminded by Gen. Victoriano Huerta, forcing Carranza to flee. He organized an army to fight against Huerta, and allied his forces with those of rebels (and former bandits) Pancho Villa and Emiliano Zapata. The combined rebel army encircled Mexico City--Huerta's base--and fought their way to the city's gates. They soon took the city, forcing Huerta to flee, and Carranza, Villa and Zapata took over the government. Soon, however, Carranza and Villa locked horns and in the ensuing power struggle, Villa was driven from Mexico City and retreated back to his headquarters in Durango. In 1915 Carranza assumed the presidency of Mexico and set about to make many needed reforms. He introduced an independent judiciary, instituted land reform, decentralized government power and called for a Constitutional convention, which was convened in 1917. A new constitution was written--which is still used today--and he was elected as the first president under this constitution.
However, many forces were arrayed against him, including his former allies Villa and Zapata, who thought his reforms didn't go far enough, and many wealthy landowners and the Catholic Church, who thought that his reforms were too radical. Carranza placed a bounty on Zapata's head, which eventually resulted in his assassination, and Carranza's army hunted down Villa in northern Mexico. As his presidential term drew to a close, however, he offended several powerful military and political leaders by picking a man they did not approve of to succeed him. In 1920 an alliance of these leaders, headed by Gen. Álvaro Obregón, led a rebellion against Carranza. His forces were defeated and he fled Mexico City. He headed toward Vera Cruz to reorganize, but on 5/21/20, he stopped in a house in the town of Tlaxacalantongo to spend the night. Obregon's spies learned of his whereabouts, and later that night the house was attacked by Obregon's men and Carranza was shot and killed. - Director
- Actor
- Writer
Maurice de Féraudy was born on 3 December 1859 in Joinville-le-Pont, Val-de-Marne, France. He was a director and actor, known for A Very Long Engagement (2004), The Next Karate Kid (1994) and La Vie En Rose (2007). He was married to Eugénie Lainé. He died on 12 May 1932 in Paris, France.- Edward Kimball was born on 26 June 1859 in Keokuk, Iowa, USA. He was an actor, known for The Christian (1914), Boys Will Be Boys (1921) and The Yellow Passport (1916). He was married to Mrs. E.M. Kimball. He died on 4 January 1938 in Hollywood, California, USA.
- Belle Gunness was born on 11 November 1859 in Selbu, Norway. She was married to Peter Gunness and Mads Albert Sorenson. She died in 1908 in Indiana, USA.
- Gilbert Clayton was born on 18 January 1859 in Polo, Illinois, USA. He was an actor, known for Blood and Sand (1922), The Silver Treasure (1926) and Main Street (1923). He was married to Josephine. He died on 1 March 1950 in Los Angeles, California, USA.
- Music Department
- Writer
- Composer
Every professional recording artist today owes their livelihood to some degree to Victor Herbert. Working closely with John Philip Sousa, Irving Berlin and others, he was the driving force in founding the American Society of Composers, Authors, and Publishers (ASCAP) on February 13, 1914. He became its vice-president and director until his death in 1924. The organization has historically worked to protect the rights of creative musicians and continues to do this work today. In 1917, Herbert won a landmark lawsuit before the United States Supreme Court that gave composers, through ASCAP, a right to charge performance fees for the public performance of their music. Herbert was born in Dublin, Ireland to Protestants Edward Herbert (d. 1861) and Fanny Herbert (née Lover). At age three and a half, shortly after the death of his father, young Herbert and his mother moved to live with his maternal grandparents in London, England, where he received encouragement in his creative endeavours. His grandfather was the Irish novelist, playwright, poet and composer Samuel Lover. The Lovers welcomed a steady flow of musicians, writers and artists to their home. Herbert joined his mother in Stuttgart, Germany in 1867, a year after she had married a German physician, Carl Schmidt of Langenargen. In Stuttgart, he received a strong liberal education at the Eberhard-Ludwigs-Gymnasium, which included musical training. Herbert had ambitions to become a physician himself, but medical education in Germany was prohibitively expensive and he fell back on his first real interest as a child, music. Initially studying the piano, flute and piccolo, he ultimately settled on the cello, beginning studies on that instrument with Bernhard Cossmann from age 15 to 18. Herbert then attended the Stuttgart Conservatory. After studying cello, music theory and composition under Max Seifritz, Herbert graduated with a diploma in 1879. He was engaged professionally as a player in concerts in Stuttgart. His first orchestra position was as a flute and piccolo player, but he soon turned solely to the cello. By the time he was 19, Herbert had received engagements as a soloist with several major German orchestras. He played in the orchestra of the wealthy Russian Baron Paul von Derwies for a few years and, in 1880, was a soloist for a year in the orchestra of Eduard Strauss in Vienna. Herbert joined the court orchestra in Stuttgart in 1881, where he remained for the next five years. There he composed his first pieces of instrumental music, playing the solos in the premieres of his first two large-scale works, the Suite for cello and orchestra, Op. 3 (1893) and the Cello Concerto No. 1, Op. 8. In 1883, Herbert was selected by Johannes Brahms to play in a chamber orchestra for the celebration of the life of Franz Liszt, then 72 years old, near Zurich. In 1885 Herbert became romantically involved with Therese Förster (1861-1927), a soprano who had recently joined the court opera for which the court orchestra played. Förster sang several leading roles at the Stuttgart Opera in 1885 through the summer of 1886. After a year of courtship, the couple married on August 14, 1886. On October 24, 1886, they moved to the United States, as they both had been hired by Walter Damrosch and Anton Seidl to join the Metropolitan Opera in New York City. Herbert was engaged as the opera orchestra's principal cellist, and Förster was engaged to sing principal roles with the Met. During the voyage to America, Herbert and his wife became friends with their fellow passenger and future conductor at the Metropolitan Opera, Anton Seidl, and other singers joining the Met.
Herbert was a prolific composer, producing two operas, one cantata, 43 operettas, incidental music to 10 stage productions, 31 compositions for orchestra, nine band compositions, nine cello compositions, five violin compositions with piano or orchestra, 22 piano compositions, one flute and clarinet duet with orchestra, numerous songs, including many for the Ziegfeld Follies, and other works, 12 choral compositions, and numerous orchestrations of works by other composers, among other compositions. Some of his best-known works were created for Broadway working with the even more prolific librettist Harry B. Smith. Many of his Broadway productions, such as The Red Mill (1906), Sweethearts (1913), Sally (1920) and Orange Blossoms (1921) were major hits, while others, such as When Sweet Sixteen (1911) were financial disasters. Herbert also composed The Fall of a Nation (1916), one of the first original orchestral scores for a full-length film (a credit often erroneously given to Max Steiner while working for Radio Pictures in the 1930's). The score was thought to be lost, but it turned up in the film-music collection of the Library of Congress. It was given a recording in 1987. During the last years of his career, was frequently asked to compose ballet music for the elaborate production numbers in Broadway revues and the shows of Irving Berlin and Jerome Kern, among others. Throughout his career he was regarded as extremely unpretentious and supportive of his peers. He was also a contributor to the Ziegfeld Follies every year from 1917 to 1924 (see 'Other Works').
As a composer, Herbert is chiefly remembered for his operettas. Of his instrumental works, only a few remained consistently within the concert repertoire after Herbert's death in 1924. However, some of his forgotten works have enjoyed a resurgence of popularity within the last few decades. A statue of him commissioned by ASCAP, by sculptor Edmund Thomas Quinn (1868-1929) was dedicated in 1927 still stands in New York City's Central Park.- Writer
- Soundtrack
English poet and scholar. He was the eldest of seven children born to Edward Housman, a solicitor, and Sarah Jane Housman (née Williams). Housman was brought up and educated in Worcestershire, winning a scholarship to Bromsgrove School in 1870. In 1877 he won another scholarship, to St. John's College, Oxford, where he studied classics. In his first Public Examination in 1879, he gained first-class honours. However, he failed his second Public Examination in 1881, partly through neglecting the study of philosophy and history, towards which the course was geared, in favour of the poetry and textual criticism in which he was interested. Consequently he left Oxford without a degree. In 1882 he began working at the Patent Office as a clerk. During this period he began publishing articles on Latin and Greek poetry, and by 1892, when he applied for the post of Professor of Latin at University College London, he had twenty-five published articles to his name. While teaching at UCL he published an edition of Ovid 's `Ibis' (in 1894). This was followed by editions of works by Manilius (1903-30, in five volumes), Juvenal (1905) and Lucan (1926). In 1911 he was made Benjamin Hall Kennedy Professor of Latin at Cambridge, where he taught until a few days before his death. He refused all the honours and awards offered him, including six honorary degrees from British universities and (in 1929) the Order of Merit. He did however accept the fellowship of St. John's College, Oxford.
Housman's first volume of poetry, 'A Shropshire Lad', was published in 1896. Although sales were initially slow, by the time his second volume, 'Last Poems', was published in 1922 it had achieved the status of a modern classic and Housman had become something of a literary celebrity, a position with which he was less than entirely comfortable. His poems are frequently concise, often suggesting the rhythms of traditional ballads. Frequently they evoke the English countryside, specifically that of Housman's native West Midlands. His subject-matter is often melancholy: recurring themes include unrequited love and the death of young men (in war, by suicide, or by hanging). A supplementary volume, 'More Poems', was published in 1936 shortly after his death, edited by his brother Laurence. The following year Laurence published a biography including eighteen further poems. Among these were poems too explicit or personal to be published during his lifetime, e.g. 'Oh who is that young sinner with the handcuffs on his wrists' (about the imprisonment of Oscar Wilde). At Oxford Housman had fallen in love with a fellow undergraduate, Moses Jackson. Jackson did not reciprocate his affection and may not even have been aware of it. He was already working at the Patent Office when Housman applied for a job there, and from 1882 to 1887 Housman lived with Jackson and his brother in lodgings in Bayswater. However, in 1887 Moses left the country for India, returning briefly two years later to marry. Thereafter his contact with Housman was minimal. 'A Shropshire Lad' was dedicated to him, as was the first volume of Housman's edition of Manilius. Housman's avowed atheism is expressed in such poems as 'Epitaph on an Army of Mercenaries' and 'Easter Hymn'. However, he also described the Church of England as 'the best religion I have ever come across', and much of his poetry echoes the language of the Book of Common Prayer and the King James Bible. Perhaps his most religious work (superficially at least) is 'For My Funeral'. This was sung as a hymn at his funeral, and recited on 17 September 1996, when a memorial was dedicated to Housman in Poet's Corner, Westminster Abbey.- Director
- Writer
- Cinematographer
Alexander Black was an American author, photographer and newspaperman born in New York City, the eldest child of Peter Black and Sarah MacCrae, both born in Scotland. After a grammar school education and teaching himself printmaking, he began his career as a newspaperman in Brooklyn and stenographer for Brooklyn courts, alongside freelance writing and photography. In 1886 he became the first president of the department of photography at the Brooklyn Institute of Arts and Sciences. He presented a magic lantern show of candid photography called "Life through a Detective Camera" (alternately titled "Ourselves as Others See Us") in 1889. Inspired by audience responses to these lectures, as well as emerging work by Eadweard Muybridge capturing the effect of motion in photography, Black began to develop a plan to bring fiction to life through dissolving slides. Over the summer of 1894, he wrote and photographed his first "Picture Play" titled Miss Jerry (1894). The finished work debuted before a live audience on October 9, 1894 at Carbon Studio, featuring a "slow movie" composed of over one hundred glass slide photographs of posed motion, accompanied by a feature-length script. Miss Jerry was well received at the time, and Black went on to create and tour with two more Picture Plays, A Capital Courtship (1896) and The Girl and the Guardsman (1899). In the years following the Picture Play, he went on to become a popular novelist, publishing several books into the 1930s, including adaptations of his three Picture Plays. He also continued to experiment with photography and film, creating several home made 16mm films featuring special effects and titles.- Virginia Ross was born on 4 July 1859 in Wheeling, West Virginia, USA. She was an actress, known for False Evidence (1919) and The Red Lantern (1919). She was married to Edward Connelly. She died on 27 January 1935 in Los Angeles, California, USA.
- Alfred Dreyfus is known, and earned his place in history, for being unwillingly at the center of a scandal that rocked France from 1894 until 1906. Dreyfus, a captain on the General Staff, had been accused of passing sensitive artillery information to Germany (it was soon discovered that another officer had actually been the spy, but the information was ignored). After a secret court-martial, Dreyfus was stripped of his rank and sentenced to life imprisonment at the Devil's Island prison in French Guiana. However, his conviction had sharply divided the French populace, with many rallying to his defense. Among them was Emile Zola, whose incendiary article "J'Accuse" and the resulting trial for libel brought the facts of the case for the first time into the public domain. By the early 1900s, it was obvious that Dreyfus had been a victim of anti-Semitism (Dreyfus was Jewish) and that the trial was fatally flawed. On July 12, 1906, Dreyfus was fully and publicly exonerated and returned to his old rank before almost immediately being promoted. Dreyfus served in the inactive reserves until World War One where as a 55-year-old man, he served with distinction at Verdun and other battlefronts, earning the Croix de Guerre and the title of Officer of the Legion of Honor. Dreyfus died on June 12, 1935, exactly 29 years to the day after his exoneration.
- George Stevens was born on 1 December 1859 in London, England, UK. He was an actor, known for Come Out of the Kitchen (1919), My Lady's Slipper (1916) and A Million Bid (1914). He was married to Katherine L.. He died on 20 August 1940 in New York City, New York, USA.
- Jean Jaurès was born on 3 September 1859 in Castres, Tarn, France. He died on 31 July 1914 in Paris, France.
- Jakob Christoph Heer was born on 17 July 1859 in Töss, Kanton Zürich, Switzerland. He was a writer, known for Eternal Love (1929), An heiligen Wassern (1932) and Der König der Bernina (1957). He was married to Emma Karoline Gossweiler. He died on 20 August 1925 in Zürich, Switzerland.
- Henri Bergson was born on 18 October 1859 in Paris, France. He was a writer, known for Film socialisme (2010), Snow (2020) and Origins of the 21st Century (2000). He was married to Louise Neuburger. He died on 3 January 1941 in Paris, France.
- Jefferson De Angelis was born on 30 November 1859 in San Francisco, California, USA. He was an actor, known for Her Great Chance (1918), The Funny Side of Jealousy (1915) and Beware of the Dog (1915). He was married to Charlotte Elliott (1895-1938 actress) and Florence Conliffe. He died on 20 March 1933 in East Orange, New Jersey, USA.
- Director
- Writer
- Actor
Franz Porten was born on 23 August 1859 in Zeltingen, Bernkastel, Rhine Province, Prussia [now Zeltingen-Rachtig, Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany]. He was a director and writer, known for Othello (1907), Der Trompeter von Säckingen (1918) and Theodor Körner (1914). He died on 21 May 1932 in Berlin, Germany.- Soundtrack
Composer ("Oh, Promise Me") and author, educated at St. John's College in Oxford, England. He also studied with Lebert, Pruckner, Vannucini, von Suppe, Genee, and Delibes. He earned an honorary Mus. D. at Racine College. He first worked in a brokerage firm, and also owned a dry-cleaning business in 1882, becoming a music critic for the Chicago Evening Post in 1889 and Harper's Weekly from 1895-1897, and the New York World between 1898 and 1900 and again between 1907 and 1912. He organized and conducted the Washington, D.C. Symphony Orchestra between 1902 and 1904, and was a member of the National Institute of Arts and Letters, and also ASCAP since 1929. He wrote the Broadway stage scores for "The Begum", "Robin Hood", "The Knickerbockers", "The Algerian", "The Fencing Master", "Rob Roy", "The Highwayman", "Papa's Wife", "The Little Duchess", "Maid Marian", "Red Feather", "Happyland", and "The Beauty Spot". His chief musical collaborator was Harry B. Smith, and his other popular-song compositions include "Brown October Ale", "Sweetheart, My Own Sweetheart", "The Spinning Song", "Little Boy Blue", "My Home Is Where the Heather Blooms", "Come, Lads of the Highlands", "Dearest Heart of My Heart", "Do You Remember Love?", "Moonlight Song", Gypsy Song", and "Hammock Love".- Mystery writer Fergus Hume was born Ferguson Wright Hume in Powick, Worcestershire, England, in 1859. His father was a doctor at a local insane asylum.
When he was four years old the family emigrated to New Zealand, where his father founded the first private mental hospital in the country, and also began Dunedin College. Fergus graduated from a local high school and then attended Otago University to study law. He received his law degree and was admitted to the New Zealand bar in 1885. That year he moved to Melbourne, Australia. He secured work as a clerk for a solicitor, but really wanted to be a playwright. Unfortunately, his only published works were a few short stories and he found it virtually impossible to break into the Austraian theater with such a meager resume. While talking to a local book dealer he discovered that detective mysteries were best sellers. He bought all of the works of Emile Gaboriau--whom the bookseller said was his most popular mystery writer--took them home and studied them inside and out, intending to write his own best-selling mystery novel and thereby get noticed by theatre directors.
The result of his efforts was "The Mystery of a Hansom Cab" (1886), his first and generally regarded as his best work. However, at the time he couldn't find a publisher who would even look at it. He wound up selling the publishing rights for 50 pounds, but kept the dramatic rights for himself. The wisdom of that move became evident when the book was turned into a play--written, of course, by Hume--and had a long and successful run in Australia and London.
Hume later moved from Australia and settled in Essex, England. A prolific writer, he turned out more than 130 works over his career. He died in Essex of cardiac arrest in 1932. - Director
- Writer
Charles-Lucien Lépine was born on 3 March 1859 in Bordeaux, Gironde, France. Charles-Lucien was a director and writer, known for Mephisto's Son (1906), Unquenchable Thirst (1906) and Scales of Justice (1907). Charles-Lucien died on 15 January 1941 in Turin, Italy.- Mathilde Brundage was born on 22 September 1859 in Louisville, Kentucky, USA. She was an actress, known for Raffles, the Amateur Cracksman (1917), My Boy (1921) and A Woman's Resurrection (1915). She died on 6 May 1939 in Long Beach, California, USA.
- Madeleine Lucette began her career as an actress and singer, joining the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company in 1878 as a soprano chorister. Before she left the company in 1882, she had also performed in the principal roles of Constance and Aline in the W.S. Gilbert and Arthur Sullivan operetta "The Sorcerer". She married fellow D'Oyly Carte singer J.H. Ryley and later, under her married name of Madeleine Lucette Ryley, became known as an author of plays, two of which were adapted into films.
- John Sturgeon was born on 1 May 1859 in Elderton, Pennsylvania, USA. He was an actor, known for Vanity Fair (1915), Martin Chuzzlewit (1912) and It Is Never Too Late to Mend (1913). He died on 20 December 1938 in Plumcreek, Pennsylvania, USA.
- Millie Liston was born on 24 April 1859 in Goderich, Ontario, Canada. She was an actress, known for Oliver Twist (1912), Traffic in Souls (1913) and A Daughter of the Gods (1916). She was married to Thomas P. Hudson, Thomas Webb Huffman and Hudson Liston. She died on 20 February 1920 in New York City, New York, USA.
- Jean Noté was born on 6 May 1859 in Tournai, Belgium. He was an actor, known for La Marseillaise (1907) and An Adventurous Automobile Trip (1905). He died on 1 April 1922 in Brussels, Belgium.
- Director
- Actor
Martinius Nielsen was born on 23 January 1859 in Copenhagen, Denmark. He was a director and actor, known for Midnatssjælen (1917), Lykketyven (1918) and Prinsens Kærlighed (1919). He was married to Oda Nielsen. He died on 10 July 1928 in Fredensborg, Denmark.- J.C. Buckstone was born on 9 September 1859 in Sydenham, London, England, UK. He was an actor and writer, known for Scrooge; or Marley's Ghost (1901), David Garrick (1913) and Old Scrooge (1913). He was married to Adela Measor. He died on 24 September 1924 in London, England, UK.
- Doris Thompson was born on 16 August 1859 in Ashfield, Massachusetts, USA. She was an actress, known for A Maid of Mandalay (1913), The Lonely Princess (1913) and The Mystery of the Stolen Jewels (1913). She was married to William V. Ranous. She died on 19 January 1916 in New Rochelle, New York, USA.
- Richard Wangermann was born on 25 September 1859 in Germany. He was an actor, known for The Scarlet Runner (1916), Through Fire to Fortune (1914) and The Grain of Dust (1918). He died on 19 June 1930 in Bronx, New York, USA.
- Willy was born on 10 August 1859 in Châtillon-Coligny, Loiret, France. He was a writer, known for Claudine en ménage (1917), Claudine s'en va (1917) and Claudine à Paris (1917). He was married to Colette. He died on 12 January 1931 in Paris, France.
- Producer
- Additional Crew
- Director
Henry W. Savage was born on 21 March 1859 in Durham, New Hampshire, USA. Henry W. was a producer and director, known for Excuse Me (1915), The Merry Widow (1925) and Robinson Crusoe (1916). Henry W. was married to Alice Louise Batcheler. Henry W. died on 29 November 1927 in Boston, Massachusetts, USA.- Additional Crew
Abraham L. Erlanger was born on 4 May 1859 in Buffalo, New York, USA. He is known for Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ (1925). He was married to Louise Balfe, Charlotte Fiscal and Adelaide Louise. He died on 7 March 1930 in New York City, New York, USA.