Charles Henry Crandall

Charles Henry Crandall (June 19, 1858 – March 23, 1923) was an American author and poet. He was a noted farmer and had become active in real estate having amassed 270 acres (1.1 km2) in Stamford by 1910. Crandall was a member of the American Institute of Arts, Science and Letters, a council member of the Stamford Rural Association, and a member of the Stamford Historical Society.

Charles Henry Crandall
Born(1858-06-19)June 19, 1858
Greenwich, New York
DiedMarch 23, 1923(1923-03-23) (aged 64)
Stamford, Connecticut
OccupationAuthor, poet
Spouse(s)Katherine Virginia Ferguson
Mary Vere Davenport
ChildrenHelen, Arthur Irwin, Robert Ferguson, Roland Crandall, Clarence Herbert, Arthur H. Crandall
Parent(s)Charles Henry Sargent Crandall
Mary Carmichael Mills

Early life

Crandall's father served in various capacities as a public official within the state of New York. These included as a member of the legislature, assistant assessor, internal revenue collector, money order clerk in the post office and a number of positions in the New York Custom House. Crandall attended Greenwich Academy, but did not matriculate from an institution of higher learning. After spending the first seventeen years of his life as a farmer, he went into the mercantile business for five years, then began a literary career.[1]

Literary accomplishments

After working as a reporter for the New York Tribune and the New York Globe, he moved to Connecticut in 1886 as a result of ill health. He called his tenure with New York with the roles of reporter, correspondent and editor, his "university years". In 1890 he published "Representative Sonnets by American Poets" with an exhaustive essay on the sonnet. Thereafter, he published a number of volumes of his own works from collections previously printed in newspapers and magazines in America. These publications included The Century Magazine, Harper's, Atlantic Monthly, The Outlook (New York), Independent, Critic, Lippincott's Monthly Magazine, North American Review, and Outing, along with others.[2] His early collections often had a rural theme and his poems and prose would often involve farming life, as he became a serious farmer. A 1914 article in Guide to Nature Magazine[2] gave him the moniker "Crandall - the Farmer-Poet".

Patriot

He had four sons who served in World War I, one of which, Robert Ferguson Crandall, died in combat in France. Despite this loss, he remained a stalwart patriot and in 1918 published Liberty Illumined and Songs for the Boys in Khaki. The Stamford Historical Society has 109 of his poems, stories and essays in either typewritten or long-hand form.[3]

Later life

In 1923, feeling despondent over increasingly ill health after penning a thank you note to his housekeeper, he committed suicide in his barn, with a pistol.

Publications
  • 1883 The Season
  • 1890 Representative Sonnets by American Poets
  • 1893 Wayside Music
  • 1898 The Chords of Life
  • 1899 Songs behind the Lines
  • 1909 Songs from Sky Meadows
  • 1918 Liberty Illumined
  • 1918 Songs for the Boys in Khaki

References
  1. Osborn, Norris Galpin, editor, Men of mark in Connecticut: ideals of American life ... Vol 3, p. 196. W. R. Goodspeed, Hartford, Connecticut 1906-1910
  2. Stamford History, Vol. VII. July 1914. No. 2
  3. Stamford History, list of Crandall's Poems and Essays
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