Probably no writer in America--or out of it, for that matter--ever
attained such universal notoriety, in such a brief space of time, as
did that king of American humorists, Artemus Ward. His career was short
but successful, and his fame will live as long as does the English
language. Charles Farrar Browne was born in the hamlet of Waterford,
Maine, on the 26th day of April, 1834, and died at Southampton,
England, March 6, 1867. After graduating from the free village school
at Waterford he sought and obtained employment in a printing office.
As a printer’s apprentice he traveled throughout the New England
States, stopping for a brief period at one place and then another.
Finally Charles settled down in Boston, where he obtained employment
as compositor in the office of a weekly paper. He soon after began to
compose comic stories and essays for different periodicals, which met
with medium success.
Browne remained there but a short time, however, being of a roving
disposition, and a few months later he gave up his idea of settling
in Boston and left for the West, with but one suit of clothes (those
were on his back) and with a few cents in his pocket. He obtained
work as local reporter on papers in Cincinnati and Toledo, Ohio, and
finally brought up at Cleveland in 1857, in which city he obtained a
situation as reporter on the morning Plain Dealer. His old associates
in Cleveland tell me that Browne at this time was considered one of
the characters of the town. His dress was always shabby and scant;
his habits irregular, and his general appearance that of a country
“greenhorn.” He delighted in wearing on his head a large crowned slouch
hat, and his pantaloons were as a rule nearly a foot too short for
him. Being tall, slim, and bony, his appearance in those days as he
slouched along the streets of Cleveland in search of items could not
have been very prepossessing, to say the least. “He was then,” says a
well known humorist, “a mild-mannered, sunny-tempered young fellow of
twenty-three, who delighted in witty anecdotes, and told droll stories
in an inimitable way.”
Despite his looks, Browne was a brilliant and ready writer. He became
involved in numerous journalistic quarrels, and his cutting remarks and
timely rebukes to his contemporaries soon made known the fact that he
could not be mastered.
A. Miner Griswold, the Cincinnati humorist, tells the following story
of Browne at that time: “The first night of our acquaintance he took
me to a school exhibition on Cleveland heights, and his whispered
comments upon the performance amused me greatly. They gave a portion
of the play of Rolla: ‘How now, Gomez, what bringest thou?’ Gomez: ‘On
yonder mountain we surprised an old Peruvian.’ Said Brown in a whisper,
‘They knew him by his bark, a small bundle of which you perceive he
carries on his shoulder.’ There have been many Peruvian bark jokes
since, but that was then fresh to me--too fresh, perhaps. But one finds
plenty of funny people at twenty-two, and I little dreamed that my
entertainer, the green young man by the name of Browne, was destined
to make the whole world laugh, and weep, too, when it heard of his
death. It did occur to me as we drove back in the buggy that my new
friend was the least bit eccentric. After riding along in silence for
a time he suddenly declared that he liked me, and asked me if I had
any objections to one embrace. Then he attempted to throw his arms
around me, but owing to the darkness, I suppose, he embraced a new plug
hat that I wore, and when he let go it was crushed into a shapeless
mass. He apologized profusely when he discovered what he had done,
appeared to give way to a momentary burst of tears, and then said that
Shakespeare wouldn’t have succeeded as a local editor, because he
hadn’t the necessary fancy and imagination.
“Barring an unreasonable desire to drive off the canal bridge into the
water, which I prevailed upon him to relinquish with some difficulty,
we reached the city without further incident. His humorous account
of the school exhibition in the next day’s paper confirmed me in the
impression that the young man by the name of Browne possessed a rare
streak of original humor.”
The following autumn Browne published his first “Artemus Ward”
letter that was extensively copied, an account of the Atlantic cable
celebration in Baldwinsville; followed soon after by the Free Lovers
of Berlin Heights, and later his letters from “Artemus Ward, showman,”
appeared, which attracted general attention.
In the early part of 1860, Browne surrendered his position as city
editor of the Plain Dealer, and left Cleveland for New York. In the
metropolis he was engaged as a contributor to Vanity Fair, a comic
weekly paper that had but recently been established. Vanity Fair was
a success for a time, but it was not lasting. Some months after his
arrival in New York, Browne was offered the position as editor of
the publication, and after some hesitancy, he accepted. The paper
suspended soon after, and the young humorist was thrown upon his own
resources once again. Several positions were offered him on various New
York journals, but he concluded to give up journalism for a time and
turn his attention to lecturing.
His first lecture, which was of a humorous nature, was delivered in New
York city, December 23, 1861, and was well received. As a lecturer he
was at once acknowledged as a success, and immediately delivered his
mirth provoking orations in various parts of the country. In 1862 he
published his first book, entitled Artemus Ward, His Book. In 1863 he
paid a visit to the Pacific coast, making an overland trip, visiting
Salt Lake city, and addressing large audiences wherever he stopped.
Returning to New York city in 1864, he opened his illustrated lectures
on California and Utah with immense success. About this time his other
books, Artemus Ward Among the Mormons, and Ward Among the Fenians,
appeared. In 1866 he was prevailed upon by his friends to visit
England, where he became a regular contributor to Punch, and gave his
lecture on the Mormons, in the British metropolis. But while he was
convulsing all London with laughter he was fast falling a victim to
consumption, and becoming worse he went to Guernsey in 1867 for the
benefit of his health. He became no better, and when he was just about
preparing to return to America, he died at Southampton, March 6, 1867.
By his will, after providing for his mother, leaving legacies to his
friends, and his library of valuable books to a school-boy friend in
his native village, he left the bulk of his property in trust to Horace
Greeley for the purpose of founding an asylum for printers.
Mark Twain, in a private letter to a friend in Tennessee, says of
Artemus Ward:
“He was one of the kindest and gentlest of men, and the hold he took on
the English people surpasses imagination. Artemus Ward once said to me
gravely, almost sadly:
“‘Clemens, I have done too much fooling, too much trifling; I am going
to write something that will live.”
“‘Well, what for instance?
“In the same grave way, he said:
“‘A lie.’
“It was an admirable surprise. I was just ready to cry; he was becoming
pathetic.”
There have been hundreds of stories of Artemus Ward going the rounds
of the American press during the past twenty years. A few of them are
founded on facts, some of them are good, but many, I am sorry to say,
are base fabrications. This is not the case, however, with the little
reminder that certain residents of Pottstown, Pennsylvania, are wont to
tell. Ward was advertised to deliver his famous lecture on the Mormons,
in the town hall, at Pottstown, during the winter of one of the earlier
years of the war. Much curiosity was excited by the announcement of
his coming, and there was every reason to expect that the hall would
be crowded on the evening of the lecture. A fierce snow storm raged
all day, however, and the night was wild and stormy. When the lecturer
was driven to the hall, he found waiting for him only five men, who
had defied the storm. Advancing to the stage, and beckoning with
the finger, as to a single individual, Artemus said, in an ordinary
conversational tone:
“Come up closer.”
Not knowing precisely what to do, the audience of five compromised with
their embarrassment by doing nothing. Artemus changed his tone to that
used by one who wished to coax, and said:
“Please come up closer, and be sociable. I want to speak to you about a
little matter I have thought of.”
The audience, thus being persuaded, came up a little closer, and the
humorist said:
“I move that we don’t have any lecture here this evening, and I propose
instead that we adjourn to the restaurant beneath and have a good time.”
Ward then put the motion, voted on it himself, declared it carried,
and, to give no opportunity for an appeal from the chair, at once led
the way to the restaurant. There he introduced himself to his intended
auditors, and spent several hours in their company, richly compensating
them for disappointment in the matter of the lecture, by the wit and
humor of the stories that he told. That was how Artemus Ward lectured
in Pottstown.
Glancing hurriedly through Ward’s volume of sketches, I find none more
amusing than his description of