ALDRICH, THOMAS BAILEY American author, was born in Portsmouth, N.H., Nov. I 1, 1836. The deepest impressions of his boyhood were made by the exotic city of New Orleans and the historic town of Portsmouth, which he portrays in his autobiographical Story of a Bad Boy (187o). He had been taken to Portsmouth to prepare for Harvard, a plan which his father's death made impracticable. After spending several years as clerk in his uncle's office in New York, the publi cation of his first book of verse The Bells (1855) and the success of his "Ballad of Babie Belle" caused him to resign to become junior literary critic on the Evening Mirror. He soon became sub-editor of Willis's other magazine, the Home Journal, and for the remainder of his life, with the exception of the time spent as war correspondent for the Tribune, he devoted himself to creative and editorial work. He was for short periods adviser to different publishing houses, but his chief work was with the magazines—the Saturday Press (1859-6o), the Illustrated News 0863), Every Saturday and the Atlantic Monthly (I 881-9o) . Although he made intimate friends of the young poets, artists and wits of New York, the cultural atmosphere of New England in which, according to him, he became `Boston plated," and the frequent European tours of his later life un doubtedly were the most influential factors in ripening his art. Few poets have so ruthlessly discarded their earlier poems in their later editions, Aldrich even going so far as to buy and destroy every copy of Pampinea (1861) that he could find. His verse is better studied, then, in his later volumes, chiefly Cloth of Gold (1874), Flower and Thorn (1877), Friar Jerome's Beauti ful Book (1881), Mercedes and Later Lyrics (1884), Windham Towers (1890), and the collected editions of 1865, 1882, 1897 and 1906. These showed him to be a poet of lyrical skill, dainty touch and felicitous conceit. In describing some single picture, mood, conceit or episode, no American poet has shown more skill. He repeatedly essayed the long narrative or dramatic poem but with less success. Beginning with the collection of stories entitled Marjorie Daw and Other People (1873), Aldrich applied to his later prose work that minute care in composition which had previously characterized his verse. His use of the surprise ending was perhaps the most effective feature of his short stories. Prudence Palfrey (1874), The Queen of Sheba (1877), and The Stillwater Tragedy (188o), novels, lack depth of characterization and vitality; but his Story of a Bad Boy (187o) has become an American classic. A Rivermouth Romance (1877) and An Old Town by the Sea (1893) commemorate with affectionate touch the author's birthplace; From Ponkapog to Pesth (1883) is made up of pleasant travel sketches; and Ponkapog Papers (1903), of pungent jottings and whimsical essays. Aldrich's later life was saddened by the death of his son, Charles, but his serenity, urbanity and charm never wholly deserted him. He died in Boston, March 19 1907.
Aldrich's Writings were collected in 1897 and in 1907 (Ponkapog ed.). Ferris Greenslet is the author of a sympathetic Life (1998), and Mrs. Aldrich wrote a pleasant volume of reminiscence, Crowding Memories (192o) .