Barbour County index. [volume] (Medicine Lodge, Kan.) 1880-current, 1900-02-28
A FAvoRITE BIRTH YEAR
More Famous Names Date from 1903
Than from Any Other Year
of the Century.

1t has been remarked that Mr.. Ho-
bart is the fourth vice president of the
United States who has died in the
month of November. His death &C.
Cured on the 21st QS99); Henry Will
son died on the 22d GS75); Elbr!dge
T. Gerry-who gave his name to the
still popular trick of gerrymandering
ON the 23d Oslo; and Thomas a.
Hendricks on the 25th QSS5). The
fact is of no significance whatever;
vet. now that attention has been called
TO it, future vice presidents will per-
haps eat their Thanksgiving dinners
with a peculiar satisfaction when the
holiday falls, as in 1899, on the last
day of the month.
A still more striking coincidence has
been familiar for the past three-quar-
tiers of century to readers of Amer
lean history. This was the death on
the same day-and that day the fif-
tieth anniversary of the Declaration of
Independence-of the second and third
presidents of the American republic,
both of them signers of the declara-
ton. and one of them its author. The
DuSSlHS away VI OOih -hOo'iAS oAiA
Thomas jefferson (the former at 81
and the latter at S3) at an interval of
few hours, on July 4, 1926, was s'Itfi-
GENTLY remarkable to suggest purpose
at least, if not agreement, on the part
of these old friends. 1t is a cOincl-
dence perhaps unmatched in history.
Against November, as, so to speak,
favorite death-month of American vice
presidents, February may be set oft
as a favorite birth month of Amer
lean and other men of genius-most
notably George Washington and Abra-
ham Lincoln. whose birthdays bring
two national holidays almost as close
together as Christmas and New Years
day. On February 3, 1900. Felix Men
delssohn would be 81 years of age: on
the Sth John Ruskin would have cele-
brated the eighty-frst anniversary
Of his birth. and Jules Verne Will
have passed the sevcnty-second. Lin
colin, Charles Darwin and James
Russell Lowell were. all three. born
on the 18th lowell would be 81 had
ne lived). On the next day Lord
Salisbury will enter upon his seventy
first year; on the 18th Ernest Lee
gouve rounds out his ninety-third, and
DIR. Weir Mitchell completes his sew
enty-first. with mental force still I'M
abated. Had February the same al
lowance of days as even the shorter
of the other months. Frederic Chopin
could be added to our list; as it is, he
misses it by the narrowest possible
margin, his natal day being March 1
(1s09.)
1t was the same year, as well ar in
the same month that three of the
names here mentioned were bestowed
upon those who made them famous
Lincoln, Darwin, Mendelssohn. In
this and the other months of 1909 oc-
Cured perhaps the greatest number
of illustrious births that can be cred
tied TO any single year of the CEN
fury now Fastening to its close. In
America we have Lincoln, Edgar Allan
Poe and DR.. Oliver Wendell Holmes :;
in England. Lord Tennyson, DR.. Glad
stone, Prof. Darwin, Lord Hougkton,
Prof. John Stuart BIackie. Edwin
Fitzgerald and Mrs. Mary Cowden
Clarke; in Germany. Mendelssohn; and
in Poland Chopin.
A further coincidence is to be noted
in the life-term of two of the most
brilliant lights in this meteoric show
er. The American poet of night
fancies and day-dreams, and the Pol
ish toEc-poet of nocturnes and etlides
were born within ten days of each
other, and died but ten days apart,
Poe's birth having occurred on Jan
uary 10, 1909, and Chopin's death on
October II, 1S49, just nine days after
the author of ''The Raven" was laid at
rest in the Baltimore churchyard.
where. for half Il century his grave
has been cared for by the man that
dug it. a suggestive comparison
night be made between the lives and
the genius of these two unhappy spir-
its of the early half of the nine
teenth century.-Joseph b. Glider. in
st. Nicholas.