James Whitcomb Riley

James Whitcomb Riley
James Whitcomb Riley (Greenfield, Indiana, October 7, 1849 - July 22, 1916) was an American writer and poet. Known as the "Hoosier Poet" and the "Children's Poet," he started his career in 1875 writing newspaper verse in Indiana dialect for the Indianapolis Journal. His verse tended to be humorous or sentimental, and of the approximately one-thousand poems that Riley published, over half are in dialect. Claiming that “simple sentiments that come from the heart” were the secret of his success, Riley satisfied the public with down-to-earth verse that was "heart high." Although Riley was a bestselling author in the early 1900s and earned a steady income from royalties, he also traveled and gave public readings of his poetry. His favorite authors were Robert Burns and Charles Dickens, and Riley himself befriended bestselling Indiana authors such as Booth Tarkington, George Ade and Meredith Nicholson. Many of his works were illustrated by the popular illustrator Howard Chandler Christy. Tomb of James Whitcomb Riley at Crown Hill Cemetery in IndianapolisRiley loved children, but he never had any of his own; he also never married. For the last twenty-three years of his life he lived on Lockerbie Street, near downtown Indianapolis, as a paying guest of his friends Major and Mrs. Charles Holstein. Indiana honored Riley after his death in 1916 by burying him in Crown Hill Cemetery in Indianapolis. The site of his grave is atop Strawberry Hill, the highest point in Indianapolis, offering a spectacular view of the city. Although Riley's poetry has fallen out of popularity, a few of his poems, such as Little Orphant Annie and Lockerbie Street, continue to be taught in schools in Indiana.

Poems

Poems Collection - poems, 2008 edition