PARK BENJAMIN SR. - AUTOGRAPH LETTER SIGNED 07/11/1864 - HFSID 169475

PARK BENJAMIN SR.
The prominent New York editor and talented sonneteer requests directions to a poem reading, written only two months before his sudden death
Autograph letter signed: "P. Benjamin" in black ink. 2 pages integral leafs, 5x8 folded, 10x8 flat. July 11, 1864. In part: "Dear Sir...Please let me know the [illegible] of the day, when the poem is to be spoken...I shall go up to Rutland. What is my best route from there? By Bellows-Stalls on Burlington?". Park Benjamin, Sr. (1809-1864) was an American poet, journalist, editor and founder of several newspapers. Born in British Guiana in South America, Benjamin was sent at an early age to study in New England, eventually graduating from Trinity College in Hartford, Connecticut; initially he studied law in Boston, but later moved to New York to begin a career in editorial work. In 1839 he partnered with Rufus Wilmot Griswold to produce The Evening Tattler, a journal which published fiction, poetry, foreign news, local gossip, jokes and New York police reports; Benjamin later founded The New World and other editorial ventures before focusing as a lecturer, public reader and periodical writer, and became close friends with writers such as Oliver Wendell Holmes, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Nathaniel Hawthorne and Edgar Allan Poe. He died very young at the age of 55 just after the birth of his son Park Benjamin Jr.; despite his widespread fame during his lifetime, Park Benjamin Sr. was virtually forgotten, known only through his sonnets such as "The Old Sexton" which is often anthologized. His son went on to become a writer, patent lawyer and physician in his own right. Normal mailing folds. Slightly toned. Light surface creases. Slightly soiled. Otherwise, fine condition.