orig. Francis Brett Harte
born Aug. 25, 1836, Albany, N.Y., U.S.
died May 5, 1902, London, Eng.
U.S. writer.
He briefly experienced camp life in California mining country before becoming a newspaper and periodical editor and writer. His works, which helped create the local-colour school in American fiction, include the short stories "The Luck of Roaring Camp" (1868) and "The Outcasts of Poker Flat" (1869), the poem "The Heathen Chinee" (1870), and the play Ah Sin (1877; with Mark Twain ). In an era when the West was a popular subject, these works made him internationally famous. His writing slumped in the 1870s, and he accepted consulships in Europe, never returning to the U.S.
Harte
By courtesy of the Library of Congress, Washington, D.C.