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Show Add to Your List of "Red Letter Days" in July Birthdays of Two Who Deserve Remembrance For Their Gifts to America's "Folk Literature" By ELMO SCOTT WATSON (Released by Western Newspaper Union. JULY has its full quota of birthdays of American notables so that we might honor half a dozen distinguished distin-guished personages on every one of its 31 days without exhausting ex-hausting the possibilities. Included In-cluded in such a list would be Presidents John Quincy Adams and Calvin Coolidge; Vice Presidents George M. Clinton, George M. Dallas and Elbridge Gerry; Henry Knox, first secretary of war, and Gideon Welles, secretary secre-tary of the navy in Lincoln's cabinet; Gen. George H. Thomas, the "Rock of Chick-amauga," Chick-amauga," and Gen. Nathan Bedford Forrest, the "Wizard "Wiz-ard 'of the Confederacy"; such naval heroes as John Paul Jones and David Farra-gut Farra-gut and Richmond Pearson Hobson; John Ericsson, Elias Howe and Samuel Colt, inventors; in-ventors; and such men of millions as John Jacob Astor, John Wanamaker, John D. Rockefeller and George Eastman. East-man. My theme, however, is not of the deeds nor achievements achieve-ments of these statesmen, soldiers and merchant princes. I sing of a humbler kind of folk those who compose com-pose the songs and poems which become the favorite "pieces" of the common people. peo-ple. And in particular, I tell of a woman and a man whose names are but little known to their fellow-Americans (compared to those cited above) but who once set pen to paper and wrote lines which will be repeated long after their authors are forgotten. MRS. ROSE H. THORPE If you have ever recited "Curfew "Cur-few Must Not Ring Tonight" at school, you should have given it a thought on July 18. For on July 18, 1850, there was born to William Wil-liam Morris and Mary Louisa (Wight) Hartwick near Misha-waka, Misha-waka, Ind., a daughter whom they named Rose Alnora. While Rose Alnora was still a pig-tailed, beribboned little girl, the family moved to a farm near Litchfield, Mich. There one day she was at home, supposedly studying her lessons. But her mother noticed that she was busily engaged in writing something on her slate. "What are you doing?" the mother demanded. Startled by the question and with a guilty feeling that she should be busy "doing her sums" instead of writing romantic verses, Rose Alnora started to erase them. But her mother stopped her, read what she had written and didn't scold her I Instead she sent the poem to the Detroit Commercial Advertiser and after it appeared in that paper pa-per it was reprinted in dozens of others. Years later it was included in a book of her poems called "Ringing "Ring-ing Ballads" and a Boston Tran-. Tran-. script reviewer wrote: "The name of Rose Hartwick Thorpe (she was married to Edmund Carson Thorpe, a writer of German Ger-man dialect recitations, in 1871) is familiar to every reader through that wonderfully popular ballad, 'Curfew Must Not Ring Tonight.' It requires peculiar genius to write a genuine ballad something that flows spontaneously spontaneous-ly from the heart and goes directly to the heart. This gift Mrs. Thorpe possesses to the fullest degree. No poem written by an American author has been so widely copied, nor has achieved so universal a popularity as the one referred to. She has written CURFEW MUST NOT RING TONIGHT SLOWLY England's sun was setUng o'er the hilltops far away, Filling all the land with beauty at the close of one sad day; And the last rays kissed the forehead of a man and maiden fair. Re with footsteps slow and weary, she with sunny, floating hair; He with bowed head, sad and thoughtful, she with lips all cold and white. Struggling to keep back the murmur, "Curfew must not ring tonight!" "Sexton," Bessie's white lips faltered, pointing to the prison old. With its turrets tall and gloomy, with its walls dark, damp and cold "I've a lover in that prison, doomed this very night to die At the ringing of the curfew, and no earthly help is nigh. Cromwell will not come till sunset"; and ber face grew strangely white As she breathed the husky whisper, "Curfew must not ring tonight!" "Bessie," calmly spoke the sexton and his accents pierced her heart Like the piercing of an arrow, like a deadly poisoned dart "Long, long years I've rung the curfew from that gloomy shadowed tower; Every evening, just at sunset. It has told the twilight hour; I have done my duty ever, tried to do it just and right, Now I'm old, I still must do it: "Curfew, girl, must ring tonight!" Wild her eyes and pale her features, stern and white her thoughtful brow, And within her secret bosom Bessie made a solemn vow. She had listened while the judges read, without a tear or sigh, "At the ringing of the curfew, Basil Underwood must die." And her breath came fast and faster, and her eyes grew large and bright, As in undertone she murmured, "Curfew must not ring tonight." With quick step she bounded forward sprang within the old church door, Left the old man threading slowly paths he'd trod so oft before; Not one moment paused the maiden, but with eye and cheek aglow Mounted up the gloomy tower, where the bell swung to and fro; As she climbed the dusty ladder, on which fell no ray of light, (Jp and up, her white lips saying, "Curfew shall not ring tonight!" She has reached the topmost ladder, o'er her hangs the great dark belL Awful is the gloom beneath her like the pathway down to hell; Lo, the ponderous tongue is swinging, 'tis the hour of curfew now, And the sight has chilled her bosom, stopped her breath, and paled her brow, Shall she let it ring? No, never! Flash her eyes with sudden light, And she springs and grasps it firmly: "Curfew shall not ring tonight!" Out she swung, far out; the city seemed a speck of light below; She 'twixt heaven and earth suspended as the bell swung to and fro; And the sexton at the bell-rope, old and deaf, heard not the bell, But be thought it still was ringing fair young Basil's funeral knell. Still the maiden clung more firmly, and, with trembling lips and white, Said, to hush her heart's wild beating, "Curfew shall not ring tonight!" It was o'er; the bell ceased swaying, and the maiden stepped once more Firmly on the dark old ladder, where for hundred years before Human foot had not been planted; but the brave deed she had done Should be told long ages after: often as the setting sun Should illume the sky with beauty, aged sires, with heads of white Long should tell the little children, "Curfew did not ring that night." O'er the distant hills came Cromwell; Bessie sees him, and her brow Full of hope and full of gladness, has no anxious traces now. At his feet she tells her story, shows her hands all bruised and torn; And her face so sweet and pleading, yet with sorrow pale and worn. Touched his heart with sudden pity lit his eye with misty light; "Go, your lover lives!" said Cromwell: "Curfew shall not ring tonight!" Mrs. Rose' Hartwick Thorpe others as perfect in a literary sense and as full of that indescribable indescrib-able rhythmic swing which characterizes char-acterizes 'Curfew' and the publisher pub-lisher has brought them together in a form which should make both author and public grateful." Nor was the reviewer exaggerating exagger-ating when he said that "no poem written by an American author has been so widely copied, nor has achieved so universal a popularity." pop-ularity." For "Curfew" has been translated into nearly every language lan-guage of the world and, in the words of another critic, is "universally "uni-versally recognized as a veritable classic." In 1883 Hillsdale college col-lege conferred upon its author an honorary M. A. degree because, be-cause, as the president of the college wrote at the time, "You have written a poem that will never permit the name of its author au-thor to die while the English language lan-guage is spoken." After the success of "Curfew Must Not Ring Tonight" Mrs. Thorpe became a regular contributor con-tributor of short stories and poems to leading magazines and weeklies and from 1881 to 1904 she published no less than a dozen doz-en books of poems and stories for young people. For the last 40 years she has lived in San Diego, Calif., and she is living there today to-day at the age of eighty-eight, still keenly interested in the world and modern conditions, although al-though she has not written any poems for 10 years. Curiously enough, she does not consider "Curfew Must Not Ring Tonight" as her best work. Instead In-stead she favors her poem "Remember "Re-member the Alamo" or possibly "The Station Agent's Story." But in the hearts of thousands of Americans who went to the "little red schoolhouse" and who used to "speak pieces" on Friday afternoons, "Curfew Must Not Ring Tonight" holds a place that is secure. Two days before you put a red circle around July 18 on your calendar in honor of the author of "Curfew Must Not Ring Tonight," To-night," you might have marked July 16 in the same way. For on July 16, 1848, was born at Johns-burg, Johns-burg, Warren county, New York, I Eben Eugene Rexford, son of I Jabez and Rebecca (Wilcox) Rex- ford, destined for future fame as ' the man who wrote "Silver Threads Among the Gold." When Eben was seven years old his parents moved to Ellington, Elling-ton, Wis. At the age of fourteen young Rexford's writing ability began to assert itself when one ! of his poems appeared in the New I York Weekly. Three years later he received his first payment for literary work from Publisher Frank Leslie of New York. Then he entered Lawrence college at Appleton, Wis., and paid his way by writing for the magazines. It was while he was a student at Lawrence that he wrote the poem which was to make him famous. fa-mous. He sold "Silver Threads Among the Gold" to Frank Leslie's Les-lie's Chimney Corner for $3. After keeping a clipping of the verses in his desk for two years, ' he showed it to a musician named H. P. Danks, who was suddenly , inspired to set it to music. That was -i 1878 and it immediately became well known. The invention inven-tion of the phonograph helped make "Silver Threads Among the Gold" one of our best known "popular ballads" and it reached the height of its fame around 1915 when Richard J. Jose, a leading tenor, insisted on featuring featur-ing it in many of his programs. After Rexford's school days were over he settled at Shiocton, Wis., to make literature his profession. pro-fession. He became a contributor contribu-tor of prose and verse to all the leading periodicals of the time and since he was also an authority author-ity on flowers he was for 10 years floricultural editor of the Ladies' Home Journal. Among his published pub-lished books were "Home Floriculture," Flori-culture," "A Work About Bulbs," "Flowers: How to Grow Them," "Grandmother's Garden," an illustrated il-lustrated poem; "Brother and Lover," a poem of the Civil war; and a collection of miscellaneous poems. Besides the song which made him most widely known, Rexford also wrote these songs which were once very popular: "Only a Pansy Blossom," "Sing a Song to Me" and a Latin version of "Jesus Lover of My Soul." He I ( .. I V-:" A EBEN E. REXFORD was also a composer of many church hymns. During his lifetime life-time he is said to have written more than 700 poems, many of them for children. Harry Gold-ing, Gold-ing, English author, in compiling compil-ing a collection of what he called the best children's verses in the English language, selected three of Rexford's. The only other American poets thus honored were Eugene Field and James Whitcomb Riley. Rexford died of typhoid fever in a hospital in Green Bay, Wis., October 16, 1916. Several years ago a large granite memorial was dedicated on the lawn of the Congregational church in Shiocton Shioc-ton which he helped build. A bronze tablet on the memorial gives the outstanding events in his career and concludes with the words "To Everyone God Gives a Share of Work, to Do Some Time, Somewhere" a quotation from one of his poems. On a July day 75 years ago there died in New York city the author of another poem which you may have recited on a Friday afternoon in the little red school-house. school-house. Or have you forgotten it? It is: WOODMAN, SPARE THAT TREE Woodman, spare that tree! Touch not a single bough! In youth it sheltered me, And I'll protect it now. 'Twas my forefather's hand That placed it near his cot; There, woodman, let it stand, Thy ax shall harm it not! That old familiar tree, Whose glory and renown Are spread o'er land and sea, And wouldst thou hew it down? Woodman, forbear thy stroke! Cut not its earthbound ties; O, spare that aged oak, Now towering to the skies! When but an idle boy I sought its graceful shade; In all their gushing joy Here, too, my sisters played. My mother kissed me here; My father pressed my hand Forgive my foolish tear, But let that old oak stand! My heart strings round thee cling, Close as thy bark, old friend! Here shall the wild birds sing, And still thy branches bend, Old tree! the storm still brave! And, woodman, leave the spot; While I've a hand to save, Thy ax shall harm it not! The man who wrote that poem was George P. Morris, who was born in Philadelphia October 10, 1802. Early in his youth, he moved to New York and at the age of fifteen fif-teen began contributing to the columns col-umns of the New York papers. One of his acquaintances in New York was a man, 17 years his elder, who was already noted as a poet and editor but who was destined for even greater fame in later years Samuel Wood-worth, Wood-worth, who wrote the song "The Old Oaken Bucket." In 1823 Morris Mor-ris and Woodworth established a new magazine, the New York Mirror and Ladies Literary Gazette. Ga-zette. Later Morris associated with him in this venture another well-known poet, Nathaniel P. Willis, Hiram Fuller, a journalist, and Theodore S. Fay, a novelist, who continued the magazine until 1842. Meanwhile, he was establishing a reputation as an author, as well as an editor, for he was a graceful grace-ful writer of both prose and poetry, poet-ry, many of the latter being set to music. One critic dubbed him 'The Song Writer of America" and his colleague, Willis, once declared de-clared that at any time he could get $50 for one of Morris' songs, unread, when no other song writer writ-er could sell one to the same buy-ir buy-ir for a shilling. With Willis he also edited a volume of "American "Ameri-can Melodies." Among the songs vvhich he wrote that became very popular in Nineteenth century America were "Near the Lake Where Drooped the Willow," "We Were Boys Together," "Land Ho!", "Long Time Ago," "Where Hudson's Wave," "My Mother's Bible," "Whip-poor-Will!" (Remember (Re-member how teacher let you whistle the chorus when you sang .hat song in school?) But his greatest fame rests -pon the poem "Woodman, Spare That Tree," which was later set to music and also became a popular pop-ular song. The incident which inspired this poem was the following: fol-lowing: Morris and a friend were walking through the woods in the neighborhood of Blooming-dale, Blooming-dale, N. Y., when his friend pointed point-ed out an old elm tree, under which he had played when a boy. While the two men were sitting sit-ting under the tree, enjoying its shade, a woodchopper came up with his ax and was ready to start cutting the tree down, when Morris' friend offered to pay him $10 if he would spare it. The woodman accepted the money and signed a bond that the tree should not be harmed during the lifetime of Morris' friend. The poem which Morris wrote, based upon this incident, became immediately popular when it was published and it was even more popular when it was set to music. Morris' long life of literary activity ac-tivity came to an end on July 6, 1864, in New York city. Most of the things which he wrote are forgotten for-gotten now all save one, "Woodman, "Wood-man, Spare That Tree." It is still remembered and quoted by thousands thou-sands of Americans who know most of its lines even though they may never have heard of the George P. Morris, the man who wrote it. |