What tour of the Cabinet would be complete without an introduction to a pair of writers who seem to have slipped under the radar—if only in name, that is.
Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.com
Our world is full of the unexplainable, and if history is an open book, all of these amazing tales right there on display, just waiting for us to explore. Welcome to the Cabinet of Curiosities. William Porter was a man of many skills. Born in Greensboro, North Carolina, in eighteen sixty two, he spent much of his younger years under his aunt's tutelage. It was his family who helped him develop his love of reading and learning. As he got older, William's aptitude extended to painting, playing the guitar, writing, and singing, skills that would come in handy when times got tough. After he graduated high school, William put his education to great use at his uncle's drug store, where he became a licensed pharmacist. In his spare time, he explored other creative endeavors, such as drawing and writing. But Greensboro had gotten a bit small for William, and the climate was even affecting his health. Over the years, he developed a bad cough that refused to heal. A family friend, doctor James Hall, had an idea to help him get better. Together, they traveled down to Austin, Texas, where William took a job working as a ranch hand for doctor Hall's son. Being outdoors and exercising daily improved his health, but he quickly realized that ranch hands barely made enough money to survive. He went back to his old ways, gaining a job as a pharmacist and writing short stories in his spare time. His stories became the talk of the town, and William found himself invited to gatherings all over Austin, and it was at one gathering in eighteen eighty five where he met Athel Estes, the woman he would eventually marry. Four years later, Athel gave birth to a daughter, Margaret. Being a new parent, though, came with new responsibilities, and those responsibilities cost money. Luckily, William's relationship with his former employer, Richard Hall, had survived over the years. When Richard became Texas Land Commissioner, he gave his old buddy William a cushy gig at the Texas General Land Office, drafting maps. The starting salary was one hundred dollars a month that's about today or thirty thous dollars a year. Nothing extravagance, but enough to live on and support a family. In turn, of the Century Austin through it. Although William never gave up on his writing. He contributed stories to newspapers and magazines whenever he could, and when he wasn't drawing maps, he was working on novels with characters based on the people he worked with. Unfortunately, his position within the General Land Office had been a political appointment, and once his friend Richard Hall was voted out in William had to resign. He's started working as a teller at the First National Bank of Austin, where he focused more on his writing than the money he was handling each day. William was a creative soul after all, and staring at numbers all day was so much less interesting than concocting new plots for his short stories. He didn't pay close attention to the records he kept, and when the bank found out, they fired him. Out of steady employment, William depended on his writing full time to make ends meet. He wrote for a weekly publication called The Rolling Stone. Then when that fizzled out, he moved his family to Houston, where he became a journalist for the Houston Post newspaper. Things started looking up for William, who had gone through several jobs in only a few years. His work at the Houston Post was even getting his name out there, as were his published fiction stories. However, unbeknownst to William, his name was also on the lips of investigators. Back in Austin. Federal auditors had discovered the lost uns that had gotten him fired. It didn't take long for them to officially charge him with embezzlement. William tried to run, but his wife's health had taken a sharp turn, and with her death looming, he decided to turn himself in. He was sentenced to five years at the Ohio State Penitentiary, where his background as a pharmacist came in handy. He got a job within the prison as the night druggist while he continued to publish his writing from his jail cell. Now, no prison was going to allow one of their inmates to have short fiction published while that inmate was serving out a sentence for embezzlement. But where there was a will, there was a way. Pun intended, of course, he sent his stories to a friend in New Orleans, who would then forward them onto publishers to hide the author's current situation. If the warden had ever found out about William's use of prison resources to further his writing career, he would have been in a lot of trouble, and the privileges he'd earned thus far would have been revoked as a fool proof way to distance himself from his work. William always authored his stories under one of many pseudonyms, but there was one that really took off during his stay at Ohio State. According to an interview he gave to The New York Times later in his life, he found the name while reading a story in the newspaper about a notable guest at a fancy ball, but that anecdote lacks the pizzazz we've come to expect from great historical figures. In a book about William Porter from nineteen seventy three, the author claimed William's pen name was born the same way all of his characters were, by using the people around him to influence his work. This time it was a prison guard by the name of Oran. Oran Henry. William Porter chopped off most of his name except for the initial letter, giving him a name we still remember today. There's even a short story award named in his honor, Oh Henry. When I look back on my middle and high school English classes. Certain authors come to mind immediately, Hemingway, of course, but also Jack London, J. D. Salinger, and one other writer in particular. His tale of Pirates, buried treasure and Tropical Islands is taught in schools all over the world and has been translated into countless languages. But it's his other story, the Gothic tale about dual personalities, that's really stuck with me over the years, and it's stuck with its author, Robert Louis Stevenson as well. The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde was first published in eight six, but parts of it were published in plays and short stories before then. Stevenson had searched for years for a way to tell the perfect good versus evil story, until the idea came to him in a dream. Suddenly inspired one night, he toiled for days, maybe even weeks, on the novella, oftentimes coming downstairs from his bedroom to read portions aloud to his wife and stepson. Stevenson called it his greatest work yet, and while the main story may have begun in a dream, he'd almost certainly pulled details from his real life. Some of those details were in the news wealthy cabinet maker Deacon William Brody had been caught and convicted from multiple charges of theft. He had led a secret double life involving hidden rooms and a costume for his nocturnal crime spree, and it was certainly an inspiring tale. But other details came to Stevenson from people he was close to. One of his friends, a French teacher named Eugene Chantrelle, had been accused of poisoning his wife. Stevenson sat in the gallery during the trial. He recalled the looks of horror and disgust on his friend's face as the prosecution and went through the details of the murder as though it had been committed by someone else entirely. The jury, though i didn't agree and Eugene was executed a short while later. Stevenson used this courtroom experience as inspiration for the story, and after the novella's completion, he did what he always did with his first draft. He gave it to his wife, Fanny. In fact, we wouldn't have Robert Louis Stevenson at all if it wasn't for her. Bannie's opinion was of the utmost importance to him. She knew what made for a good story, and often wrote her comments in the margins of the pages for her husband's benefit. You might call her his number one editor. You might also call her his greatest critic. On this occasion, Bannie's criticisms were not exactly constructive. She referred to her husband's seminal work, a story that has been adapted for the stage and screen over one times since its publication, as acquire full of utter nonsense. She knew it could be better, but her husband needed a bit of motivation. In a letter she wrote to a friend shortly after she'd read the draft, Banny said she'd planned on burning it before it ever reached reader's hands, but she never got the chance. Robert read through his wife's marginal notes, and, in a fit of rage over his wasted time and effort, tossed the pile of pages into the fireplace himself, watching the flames reduce it all to ashes. Upon realizing what he'd done, he spent the next three days feverishly rewriting the draft while sitting up in bed. According to some biographers, Robert had been sick for weeks and was hopped up on cocaine. The entire time he wrote it, adding a bit of real life inspiration to Dr Jekyl's ingestion of a serum to become a completely different person. The Strange Case of Dr Jekyl and Mr Hyde became a great success almost immediately. It made Robert Louis Stevenson a household name. But we might not be teaching it in classrooms today if it wasn't for his wife, who saw its potential even at its worst. She said as much in that letter written to a Mr. William Henley. Henley was a poet and editor in his own right, but also a longtime friend to both Fannie and Robert, and for good reason. Robert saw something in him, a cleverness and a joy that warmed everyone around him. But he also saw something else, well, not exactly according to him, there was something about William Henley that wasn't visible, that was inspiring. Years before he had completed that rewrite of Dr Jekyl's Tale of Transformation, Robert Louis Stevenson had worked on another story. It was a novel that needed an antagonist. Now. Henley wasn't a mean guy. Everyone who knew him thought only the best of him, and his jovial nature, but Henley had suffered from tuberculosis at the age of twelve. The complications from the disease had cost him dearly, and doctors had amputated his left leg below the knee. And that was the key detail. Robert borrowed, just as he had done so many times before, for one of the most famous villains in all of English literature, the legendary pirate himself long John Silver. I hope you've enjoyed today's guided tour of the Cabinet of Curiosities. Subscribe for free on Apple Podcasts, or learn more about the show by visiting Curiosities podcast dot com. The show was created by me Aaron Manky in partnership with how Stuff Works. I make another award winning show called Lore, which is a podcast, book series, and television show, and you can learn all about it over at the World of Lore dot com. And until next time, stay curious.