Rensselaer Republican, Volume 18, Number 7, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 22 October 1885 — DEATH OF A HUMORIST. [ARTICLE]

DEATH OF A HUMORIST.

Josh BUl|ngs Dies Suddenly of Apo- , plexy In a California Hotel.

IMonterey (Cat) telegram.] Henry W. Shaw, better known as “Josh Billings, ” died at 10 o’clock this morning, of appoplexy. The body will be embalmed and sent East. About 9:45 this morning Dr. Heintz was summoned to Hotel del Monte to attend Mr. Shaw, who was sitting in a chair in the vestibule, apparently enjoying the best of health. When the physician arrived Mr. Shaw complained of a severe pain in the chest and remarked: “My doctors East ordered rest of brain,” and added, throwing back his long hair, “but you can see I do not have to work my brain for a simple lecture; it domes spontaneously.” While he was talking he suddenly threw his hands, over his head and fell backward unconscious. He was carried to his room, and at the end of three minutes life was extinct His -wife, who accompanied him on his trip to the Pacific coast, was with him during his last moments. His face has retained a perfectly natural expression and bears no indications of pain. He was to have lectured here Friday for the benefit of a local lodge of Good Templars. At the hotel he had made himself a general favorite by his good-natured ways. * ——_____ Sketch of His Career. Henry W. Shaw was bom at Lanesborough, Massachusetts, in 1818. and was a grandson of Dr. Samuel Shaw, member of Congress from Vermont during the war of 1812. His father was also a member of Congress. His uncle, John Savage, served as Chief Justice of New York. At the age of fifteen Henry went ’West and became a farmer and auctioneer for twenty-five years, when he settled in Poughkeepsie, N. Y., at the latter vocation. His first production made public was written May 25, 1863, over the name of “Josh Billings,” he being over forty-five years of age. Since then his philosophy and quaint spelling have given him a high reputation for originality and a deep insight into human nature. His “Allminax” atta’ned at one time an immense circulation. While editing a small paper in Poughkeepsie, to. which place he had come for the purpose of educating his daughters, he compared several of his humorous essays with those jf Artemus Ward, and wondered why his own had failed to strike the popular taste. Concluding that the secret of success was Vi the fonetic spelling, he adopted it in his 'Essa on the Muel,” and disposed of it for $1.50, his first earnings in the line of literature. The essay was extensively eop*led, and further efforts in the same line »oon made his name a household word. During the last seventeen years he has ■delivered a thousand lectures, Underneath the bad spelling of his proverbs and aphorisms there is at times a depth of wisdom and philosophy which gives him a higher place in the world than that of a mere humorist, and which is often overlooked by those who are amused merely by his peculiarities.