O. Henry - (1862-1910)
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Carolina students Chris and Justin, or New York students Daniel Golden and Ally Feldman and Veronika Fernandez. I. Upbringing, Education, Family and Professional Life William Sidney Porter was born near Greensboro, North Carolina on September 11, 1862. Three years later his mother died and his father who was a doctor was left to care for him.
His only formal education came from his aunt who ran a private school in his neighborhood for him and other local children. His uncle owned a pharmacy and he worked there and
became a licensed pharmacist before the age of twenty. His sketches and drawings of people in Greensboro were known all about the town and he was a local celebrity.
At the age of twenty, Porter moved to Texas and worked on a sheep ranch. Sources say he moved to Texas for health reasons and there he stayed until 1898. He lived with an old
family friend Richard M. Hall where his experiences would prove relevant later in his short stories. In 1884, he left the ranch and moved to Austin where he stayed in the home of
Joseph Harrell and held many jobs in Austin. There he first used his pen name, O. Henry. In 1887, he worked as a draftsman in the General Land Office, then headed by his friend
Richard Hall. In 1891, Porter resigned and took a job as a teller at the First National Bank. It is said that his pen name was derived from the calling of the family cat. Imagine if you
will an old woman calling the cat, "Oh, Henry!" This is where his pseudonym was created and it just stuck for the rest of his career. He used the pseudonym later in his life more
than in his early life. After his release from prison it was used as a cover to hide his true identity. In 1887, he married Athol Estes and their first child was born a year later. However because
of complications, the child died just hours after birth. Then, in September of 1889, they had their first daughter, Margaret Worth Porter. Shortly before 1895, he founded the Rolling Stone
, a weekly humor publication that had no success. Then, in 1895, he started writing for the Houston Daily Post. In this time, Porter was accused of embezzling funds from the
First National Bank, a place where he formerly held a job. As a result of the charges to avoid standing trial, he left his wife and daughter in Austin
and ran away to New Orleans. Shortly, thereafter, he left New Orleans and went to Honduras and then soon returned back to Austin because his wife was dying. She was
suffering from tuberculosis. He returned in January of 1897 to be by his wife's side and soon after he got back, she died on July 25, 1897. Then, in February of 1898, Porter was
convicted of embezzling charges and was put in jail for five years in a jail in Ohio. While in jail, he worked as a pharmacist so he did not receive the general prisoner
treatment. This work gave him more free time than the normal prisoner so he could continue his writing career and better himself as a person. While in the penitentiary, he
wrote at least twelve short stories. One of these was published before he left jail and then moved to New York. While in New York, he was employed with the New York Sunday World to write a feature
story every week. In 1904, Porter published his first book which was entitled Cabbages and Kings. Then, in 1906, he published other books which included many of his short stories,
they were a type of an anthology series. After being released from jail, Porter made a comeback under the pseudonym O. Henry which was used even more to hide his identity. From this time until his death he published
over 300 of his best short stories. He wrote many stories about Texas and his life there. In 1907, he married a childhood sweetheart named Sara Lindsay Coleman, he would live with
her by his side for the next few years until his death. He died on June 5, 1910, at the age of 48, after living months in very poor health. II. Literary Works
"The Gift of the Magi" is one of O. Henry's most famous tales. It tells of self-sacrifice between a loving husband and wife. This story displays all of the qualities of a perfect
family or what the world perceives to be one. Love is shared unselfishly and real issues are viewed in fictional form. Very few of his stories capture the greatness and the relativity of "The Gift of the Magi."
One of O. Henry's most prominent themes was things are not always as they seem. This was displayed quite prominently in "The Cop and the Anthem." This story also displayed
his greatest attributes being able to write about something that seems boring to the normal eye yet when he writes about it, it was brought to life. Many critics state that he shows a
"loveableness" in "The Cop and the Anthem" which has won him many fans the world over. One of O. Henry's good books was called, the Trimmed Lamp. It was a collection of some
of his finest short stories. One critic said, "O. Henry's stories are as disorderly as the streets of the city he loves so well." The Trimmed Lamp was with respect to his other
collections almost the exact same. He had picked up a few new strategies but his stories still seemed the same. They were well written but not about anything special and that
quality got people to love his writing. III. Literary Works O. Henry wrote nearly six hundred short stories. Listed below are some of his novels, short
stories and collections of short stories. After Twenty Years & Other Stories (1957) IV. Sources
The Best of O. Henry (1929)
The Best of O. Henry (1978)
The Best Short Stories of O. Henry (1945)
Cabbages and Kings (1904)
The Complete Works of O. Henry (1911)
Complete Writings of O. Henry (1917)
The Four Million (1906)
The Gentle Grafter (1908)
The Gift of the Magi (1922)
The Gift of the Wise Men (1911)
Heart of the West (1907)
Let Me Feel Your Pulse (1910)
Letters to Lithopolis (1922)
O. Henry Encore (1909)
O. Henryana (1920)
O. Henry's New York (1962)
Options (1909)
Postscripts (1923)
The Ransom of Red Chief, and Other O. Henry Stories for Boys (1918)
Roads of Destiny (1909)
Rolling Stones (1912)
Selected Stories from O. Henry (1922)
Sixes and Sevens (1911)
Strictly Business (1910)
Tales of O. Henry (1969)
The Trimmed Lamp, and Other Stories (1907)
The Voice of the City (1908)
Waifs and Strays, Twelve Stories (1917)
Whirligigs (1910)
The Works of O. Henry (1911)
http://statelibrary.dcr.state.nc.us/nc/ncsites/greensbo/O_henry.htm
http://www.mayanriviera.com/pubs/coconut/feature.stm
http://dive.woodstock.edu
This essay was submitted by a student of Rita Achenbach, a teacher at Fuquay-Varina High School in Fuquay-Varina, North Carolina.