Historic leaves, volume 2, April, 1903 - January, 1904

[1]

Historic leaves

Vol. II. April, 1903. no. 1.

Literary men and women of Somerville.

By David Lee Maulsby.¹

after accepting the invitation of the Somerville Historical Society to address it upon the men and women of this city who have been writers, I found it necessary to draw some lines of limitation about the subject. To treat, even inadequately, all of our fellow-citizens that have issued their thoughts in print would be a greater undertaking than a single hour could see completed. It has seemed wise, therefore, to mark a boundary of demarcation between the dead and the living, and to confine this paper to those Somerville authors that are no longer our flesh-and-blood companions. Thus we shall avoid the embarrassment of selection among present-day writers, and shall also have a subject that is clearly defined, and of moderate extent.

One further limitation has seemed proper. There are two persons of distinction who have lived in Somerville, but who can hardly be included among her literary men. I mean Governor Winthrop and Edward Everett. Neither is literary, in the strictest sense of the word, though both have left books behind them. And in any event their connection with the city seems so remote or so accidental that they may well be dismissed from a paper of this kind, after mere mention.

There is another group of men who stand upon the threshold