Josh
Billings was the pen name of 19th-century American humorist Henry
Wheeler Shaw (April 21, 1818 October 14, 1885). Although
his reputation has not endured so well with later generations,
in the latter half of the 19th century he was a famous humor writer
and lecturer in the United States, perhaps second only to Mark
Twain.
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Shaw
was born in Lanesborough, Massachusetts on April 21, 1818. His
father was Henry Shaw, who served in the United States House of
Representatives from 181721,[8][9] and his grandfather Samuel
Shaw who also served in the U.S. Congress from 18081813.
His uncle was John Savage, yet another Congressman.
Shaw
attended Hamilton College, but was expelled in his second year
for removing the clapper of the campus bell.[2][10] He married
Zipha E. Bradford in 1845.[2]
Shaw
worked as a farmer, coal miner, explorer, and auctioneer before
he began making a living as a journalist and writer in Poughkeepsie,
New York, in 1858. Under the pseudonym "Josh Billings"
he wrote in an informal voice full of the slang of the day, with
often eccentric phonetic spelling, dispensing wit and folksy common-sense
wisdom. His books include Farmers' Allminax, Josh Billings' Sayings,
Everybody's Friend, Choice Bits of American Wit and Josh Billings'
Trump Kards. He toured, giving lectures of his writings, which
were very popular with the audiences of the day.[11] He was also
reputed to be the eponymous author of the "Uncle Ezek's Wisdom"
column in the Century Magazine.
Billings
died in Monterey, California on October 14, 1885.[12] Billings'
death is described in Chapter 12 of John Steinbeck's fictional
Cannery Row. According to Steinbeck's homage, Billings died in
the Hotel del Monte in Monterey after which his body was delivered
for burial preparation by the local constable to the town's only
doctor, who also doubled as an amateur mortician. The doctor,
per his usual embalming protocol, dispensed of Billings' entrails
by tossing them into the gulch behind his house before packing
the torso with sawdust. The stomach, liver and intestines were
found in the gulch the following morning by a dog whose master,
a small boy, intended on using them for fish bait. Some local
men, realizing the disgrace this could bring to Montereya
town proud of its literary heritagewere able to stop the
boy as he was preparing to row out to sea, retrieved the tripas
and forced the doctor to give Billings' organs a proper burial
befitting a great author.
Billings'
daughter Grace Shaw Duff donated money for the building of Wilhenford
Hospital in Augusta, Georgia, which opened in 1910. The name combined
a syllable of her father's' name (Hen) with her husband's and
son's.
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His
saying, "In the whole history of the world there is but one
thing that money can not buy... to wit the wag of a dog's tail"
appears at the beginning of the Disney film Lady and the Tramp.[14]
The
phrase, "Love is like measles... the later in life it occurs,
the tougher it gets," was quoted as being Josh Billings'
in Jan Karon's book, A Light in the Window.[15]
While
the Squeaky Wheel analysis was used in different forms before
Billings, his poem, "The Kicker" brought the idiom into
common usage of American language. The term "kicker"
at the time in the 1800s was another term for a complainer. The
poem is:
I
hate to be a kicker,
I always long for peace,
But the wheel that does the squeaking,
Is the one that gets the grease.
"Consider the postage stamp, son. It secures success through
its ability to stick to one thing till it gets there."
"Solitude
is a good place to visit, but a poor place to stay."
"It
is better to know less than to know so much that ain't so."[16]
Hong
Kong movie Revenge: A Love Story ends with his quote "There
is no revenge so complete as forgiveness."
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