Death of Noah Webster
On May 28, 1843, author and lexicographer Noah Webster died in New Haven, Connecticut. Webster developed several important textbooks as well as the dictionary that standardized the American spelling of many words.
Literature
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First Publication of Dracula
On May 26, 1897, Bram Stoker’s Dracula was first published in London, England. It went on to become one of the most famous pieces of English literature and has been adapted for film more than 30 times.
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Happy Birthday Ralph Waldo Emerson
Author Ralph Waldo Emerson was born on May 25, 1803, in Boston, Massachusetts. A leader of the Transcendentalist movement, he promoted individualism and was a major influence on generations of thinkers, writers, and poets.
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Birth of Katherine Anne Porter
Katherine Anne Porter was born Callie Russell Porter on May 15, 1890, in Indian Creek, Texas. Porter was best known for her long short stories written in flawless prose, which have a texture and complexity usually found only in novels.
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The Old Man of the Mountain
On May 3, 2003, the Old Man of the Mountain rock formation in New Hampshire collapsed. It had been the official state emblem for decades, and continues to appear on license plates and other items.
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Library of Congress Founded
On April 24, 1800, President John Adams officially established the Library of Congress. It’s America’s oldest federal cultural institution, and one of the largest libraries in the world, with more than 171 million items.
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Birth of Nella Larsen
Harlem Renaissance novelist Nellallitea “Nella” Walker Larsen was born on April 13, 1891, in Chicago, Illinois. Though her writing career was brief, Larsen produced some of the first groundbreaking works to focus on mixed race identity and the feeling of not belonging.
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Birth of Robert Frost
Robert Frost was born on March 26, 1874, in San Francisco, California. He’s the only poet to have won four Pulitzer Prizes for Poetry and has been called one of America’s “public literary figures, almost an artistic institution.”
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Happy Birthday Ezra Keats
Ezra Jack Keats was born on March 11, 1916, in Brooklyn, New York. Keats was a writer and illustrator of children’s books, most famously, The Snowy Day.
