Electromagnets by Joseph Henry. Biography of O. Henry Active period of creativity

Synonyms for the name Henry. Heinrich, Harry, Amerigo, Harris, Aymeric, Garrison, Henk, Emery, Rico, Enrico, Quint, Kiko, Henricus, Genio, Geniek, Henrik, Heinz, Heike, Henrik, Henry, Hennie.
Origin of the name Henry. The name Henry is German, English, and Catholic.

The name Henry is an English name that comes from the Old French name Henry, which in modern times sounds like Henri. In turn, Henry, Henri, was formed from the German name Heinrich, which has the translation “rich homeowner”, “head of the house”, “lord of the court”.

The short form of the name Henry - Harry - in medieval England was considered a colloquial form of the name Henry. Among English kings, the name Henry was identical to the name Harry. And from both forms of the name Henry, female names were formed - Harriet and Henrietta.

The name Henry has been very popular in English-speaking countries for many centuries. In 2007, Harry was the fifth most popular boy's name in England and Wales, and is among the top 50 names in Ireland and Scotland.

There is one version according to which the name of the continent of America may come from the name of the explorer, traveler and cartographer Amerigo Vespucci. And the name Amerigo is one of the variations of the name Henry in the following sequence: Amerigo - Emerich - Henrich - Henry.

The name Henry has analogues in various languages. So in English the name Henry can sound like Aymeric, Harry, Harrison, Heriot, Gerriot, Harris, Henderson, Henk, Hal, Emery, in Italian - Amerigo, Arrigo, Rico, Engio, Enrico, in Spanish - Americo, Inrique, Quint , Kike, Kiko, Enrique. In Latin, the name Henry will sound like Aenrichus, Henricus, in Polish - Geniek, Genio, Henrik, in German it will be closer to the name Heinrich - Heinrich, Heinrik, Heinz, Hendrick, Heike, Heiko, Heiner, Henning, Henrik. In France, the boy Henry will be called Henry, Emery, Emeric, Henri, in Lithuania - Henrikas, Herkus, in the Netherlands - Hendrik, Heike, Heiko, Hein, Heino, Henk, Hennie, Henning, in Turkey - Henry.

The name Henry is also a surname. The name Henry does not have an Orthodox name day. For the name Henry, Catholic name days will be indicated, some of the dates repeat the Catholic name days of Henry.

Henry's birthday

Famous people named Henry

Henry Bennett ((1823-1890) English rose breeder. Founder of modern methods of crossing roses with planned selection of pairs and hand pollination. Considered one of the creators of hybrid tea roses.)
Henry Thomas Buckle ((1821-1862) English historian, author of The History of Civilization in England. Also known as a chess player.)
Harry Harrison ((1925 - 2012) real name - Henry Maxwell Dempsey; American science fiction writer and editor, who recently lived in Ireland. Harry Harrison is the author of more than two hundred published stories and 35 novels.)
Henry Breadon Everard ((1897-1980) British political and colonial figure, acting President of Rhodesia (1975-1976, 1978, 1979))
Henry Hallam ((1777-1859) English historian)
Henry (Henri) I of Lorraine, nicknamed Marked or Chopped ((1550 - 1588) 3rd Duke of Guise (1563-1588), Prince de Joinville, Peer of France (1563-1588), Knight of the Order of the Holy Spirit (1579). French military and statesman during the Wars of Religion in France. Head of the Catholic League. Eldest son of François of Lorraine, Duke of Guise.)
Henry Ayrton ((1610-1651) English general)
Henry Barrow ((c.1550-1593) English religious leader, Puritan)
Henry James ((1843-1916) American writer, took British citizenship a year before his death; brother of the outstanding psychologist William James. A major figure in transatlantic culture at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries. Over 51 years of literary work, he wrote 20 novels, 112 stories and 12 plays A common thread running through his entire work is the theme of spontaneity and naivety of the representatives of the New World, who are forced to adapt or challenge the intellectuality and treachery of the declining Old World (“Daisy Miller”, 1878; “Portrait of a Lady”, 1881; “Ambassadors”, 1903 ).)
Henry David Thoreau ((1817-1862) American writer, thinker, naturalist, social activist, abolitionist)
Henry Raymond Fitzwalter "Harry" Keating ((1926-2011) popular English writer and famous critic, winner of two Golden Daggers, a prestigious literary award, for works in the detective genre)
Henry King ((1886-1982) American actor and film director. Winner of the Golden Globe Award for directing the film “The Song of Bernadette” (1943). Known for his fruitful creative collaboration with actors Tyrone Power and Gregory Peck, as well as film adaptations of several works by E. Hemingway .)
Henry Court ((1740-1800) English metallurgist. Drew attention to the low quality of English iron supplies compared to foreign ones. The study of this issue led Henry Court to the discovery of methods for producing industrial iron of higher quality. Received several patents - in 1783 in rolling processes using grooved rollers and in 1784 in the field of puddling.)
Henry Mackenzie ((1745-1831) Scottish writer, playwright, poet and publisher)
Henry Gwyn Jeffreys Moseley (English physicist, one of the founders of X-ray spectroscopy)
Henry Morgenthau ((1856-1946) US Ambassador to Turkey during the First World War)
Sir Henry Wylie Norman ((1826-1904) British military leader, colonial administrator, field marshal)
O. Henry ((1862 - 1910) pseudonym, real name - William Sidney Porter; outstanding American writer, prose writer, author of popular short stories, recognized master of short stories characterized by subtle humor and unexpected endings)
Henry Parland ((1908-1930) Finnish poet and prose writer, wrote in Swedish)
Henry Reznik ((born 1938) Soviet and Russian lawyer, Honored Lawyer of the Russian Federation (1998), member of the Public Chamber, President of the Moscow Bar Chamber)
Henry Potter ((1881-1955) American golfer, silver medalist at the 1904 Summer Olympics)
Sir Henry Creswick Rawlinson ((1810 - 1895) British archaeologist, Assyriologist, linguist and diplomat. He gained fame as a decipherer of Persian cuneiform. Risking his life, in 1837-1844 he repeatedly climbed the Behistun rock to copy the Persian and Elamite parts of the Behistun inscription, which he later deciphered it.)
Henri Alleg ((born 1921) real name - Henry Salem; French-Algerian journalist and politician of Jewish origin, member of the Algerian Communist Party and an active participant in the anti-colonial movement. Author of a famous investigative book about the use of brutal torture by the French military during the War of Independence Algeria's "Interrogation", which was filmed in 1977.)
Henry Slesar ((1927-2002) real name - Heinrich Schlosser; American writer. He also published under literary pseudonyms - O.H. Leslie, Jay Street.)
Henry Morton Stanley GCB ((1841 - 1904) real name - John Rowlands; journalist, famous traveler, explorer of Africa. Knight Grand Cross of the Order of the Bath.)
Henry Taube ((1915-2005) American chemist of Canadian origin. Worked on the mechanism of electron transfer in redox reactions. Winner of the 1983 Nobel Prize in Chemistry “for his study of the mechanisms of electron transfer reactions, especially metal complexes.”)
Henry Steel Olcott (Olcott) ((1832-1907) one of the founders and first president of the Theosophical Society, participant in the American Civil War, colonel, lawyer, journalist and writer. Also known as the first prominent Westerner to convert to Buddhism. His activities As head of the Theosophical Society, he helped to revive Buddhism, and for this he is revered in Sri Lanka.)
Henry Mancini ((1924 - 1994) real name - Enrico Nicola Mancini; American conductor and film composer. He wrote music for almost 500 films and television series, released 50 albums, received 4 Oscar awards for his music, 2 Emmy nominations and 20 Grammy Awards, including a Lifetime Achievement Award (1995).
Henry Lazarus ((1815 - 1895) British clarinetist and basset horn player, one of the greatest English musicians of the 19th century)
Henry Bridgman, also known as Henry Avery, John Avery, Arch-Pirate and Long Ben ((1653-1699) pirate, called "one of the most successful buccaneers and gentlemen of fortune")
Henry Bessemer ((1813-1898) English inventor, member of the Royal Society of London since 1879. Bessemer had over 100 patents for inventions in various fields of technology: a needle stamp for stamps, a casting machine (1838), a machine for pressing sugar cane (1849 year), a centrifugal pump (1850), etc. Work on improving a heavy artillery shell (1854) prompted him to search for a more advanced method of producing cast steel for gun barrels. In the same 1854, Bessemer patented an automatic water-cooled gun for a unitary cartridge In 1856, he registered a patent for a converter for the conversion of liquid iron into steel by blowing air without consuming fuel, which became the basis of the so-called Bessemer process.In 1860, Bessemer patented a rotating converter with air supply through the bottom and axles, the design of which has largely been preserved until now. Bessemer put forward the idea of ingotless rolling of steel.)
Henry Wittenberg ((1918-2010) American freestyle wrestler, Olympic champion of the London Games (1948))
Sir Henry Hardinge, 1st Viscount Hardinge of Lahore and King's Newton of Derbyshire ((1785-1856) British military and political leader, field marshal)
Henry Clay ((1777-1852) American lawyer, politician and statesman. He received the nickname "The Great Master of Compromise" for his work in preventing the division of the United States over the issue of slavery. Clay played an important role in the passage of the Missouri Compromise and the Compromise of 1850. In 1957, a Senate committee led by John F. Kennedy named Clay one of the five most distinguished senators in U.S. history.)
Henry Lee Lucas ((1936-2001) famous American serial killer. He has 11 proven murders], although during the investigation he admitted to more than 300 murders, of which only 213 can be regarded as more or less plausible. The exact number of victims Lucas is still the subject of controversy and various speculative theories.)
Henry Morgan ((1635-1688) English navigator (originally from Wales), pirate, known under the nickname “Cruel”, later vice-governor on the island of Jamaica, who actively pursued English colonial policy. During the era of the struggle between England and Spain for supremacy at sea, he undertook several military campaigns against Spanish possessions in the Caribbean Sea. His first large-scale operation was a raid on the city of Puerto del Principe. The “pearl” of raids and sabotage was the sack and destruction of the city of Panama in 1671.)
Henry Valentine Miller ((1891-1980) American writer and artist. His life formed the basis of his scandalous novels for that time about the world after the First World War and about the fate of the writer in this world. Miller’s most famous works are the novels “Tropic of Cancer”, “Tropic of Capricorn” and “Black Spring”, which made up an autobiographical trilogy.)
Henry Payne "Hank" Aiba ((1904-1993) American basketball coach. Aiba led the US men's team at the 1964, 1968 and 1972 Olympic Games - his players won gold medals twice, and in 1972 they lost to the USSR team in a scandalous final match. Aiba is the only coach in basketball history to win two Olympic gold medals.Aiba was inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame in 1969 and the FIBA Hall of Fame in 2007. Henry Aiba is named after the Collegiate Basketball Coaches Award, presented annually in conjunction with Oscar Robertson Trophy, and the sports arena at Oklahoma State University is named after Aiba.)
Henry Archer ((1806-1863) entrepreneur of Irish origin, organizer of the construction and operation of railways, inventor of the world's first punching machine (1848))
Henry Noel Brailsford ((1873-1958) English left-wing journalist)
Henry Lawrence Gantt ((1861-1919) ally of the “father of scientific management” Frederick Taylor (1856-1915). Gantt studied management using the example of building ships during the First World War and proposed his own diagram, consisting of segments (tasks) and points (final tasks, or milestones), as a means of representing the duration and sequence of tasks in a project. Henry Lawrence Gant noted the leading role of the human factor in production, considering it necessary to provide the worker with the opportunity not only to earn a living, but also to gain a sense of satisfaction. Moreover, he was a harbinger of the coming democracy in production and the humanization of the management system. Gant did a lot to improve the functioning of the enterprise by improving systems for setting tasks and motivating their use.)
Henry Hudson (Hudson) ((1570?-1611?) English navigator of the early 17th century. His date and place of birth are precisely unknown.)
Henry Koster ((1905 - 1988) real name - Hermann Kosterlitz; German and American director and screenwriter of Jewish origin)
Henry Meredith Leaf ((1862-1931) British racketeer, Summer Olympic medalist)
Henry Tingle Wild ((1872-1912) lieutenant, senior officer of the Titanic liner)
Henry Edward Wallace ((1888-1965) US politician)
Henry Osborn ((1857-1935) famous American geologist, eugenicist and paleontologist. For many years he was president of the American Museum of Natural History in New York. He described many genera of fossils, including the tyrannosaurus (Tyrannosaurus).)
Henry Ford ((1863-1947) American industrialist, owner of car factories around the world, inventor, author of 161 US patents. His slogan was “a car for everyone” - the Ford plant produced the cheapest cars at the beginning of the automobile manufacturing era. “Ford Motor Company "exists to this day. Henry Ford is also famous for being the first to use an industrial assembly line for mass production of cars. Contrary to popular belief, the assembly line was used before, including for mass production, for example in Chicago slaughterhouses in the 19th century. However, Henry Ford was the first to “put on the assembly line" a technically complex product, that is, one that needed technical support throughout its entire lifespan, a car. Ford’s book “My Life, My Achievements” is a classic work on the scientific organization of labor. It was published in 1924 in the USSR. This book became the source of such a complex political economic phenomenon as Fordism.)
Henry Hinrichsen ((1868-1942) German publisher)
Henry Yule Hind ((1823-1908) English and Canadian geographer and geologist)
Henry Rowe Schoolcraft (1793-1864) American geographer, geologist and ethnographer, known for his studies of American Indian culture, as well as his expedition to the sources of the Mississippi River in 1832.
Sir Fredrick Henry Royce ((1863 - 1933) baronet, British engineer, engine and automobile designer, entrepreneur, who founded the Rolls-Royce company together with Charles Rolls)
Henry Picker ((1912-1988) German lawyer and writer, legal officer at Hitler's main headquarters)
Henry Oldenburg ((1618-1677) German, later English theologian, diplomat and scientist)
Henry Spencer Moore ((1898 - 1986) British artist and sculptor)
Henry Flood (Flood) ((1732-1791) Irish politician during the English rule)
Henry John Heinz ((1844-1919) German-American businessman. In 1869, he, together with his neighbor Clarence Noble, organized the company Heinz & Noble. In 1875, the company went bankrupt, and Henry registered the company F. & J. Heinz to his brother John and cousin Frederick. Henry bought the company from his relatives in 1888 and renamed it H.J. Heinz. He served as head of the company from 1905 until the end of his life.)
Henry Schultz ((1893-1938) American economist of Polish origin)
Henry Hanney Youngman ((1906-1998) American humorist of British origin. He gained wide fame thanks to his one-liner jokes, one line long. While many conversational artists of that time composed their program from stories about funny incidents and anecdotes, Henry Youngman used only one-line jokes in his performances, interspersed with playing the violin. Youngman's performances lasted no more than 20 minutes, but were filled with thoughtful humor.)
Henry Christian Timm ((1811-1892) American pianist, organist, conductor and composer of German origin)
Henry Flynt ((born 1940) American philosopher, avant-garde musician, representative of anti-art. He invented the term “conceptual art”)
Henry Janes Fonda ((1905-1982) American stage and film actor, Oscar winner, father of actor Peter Fonda and actress Jane Fonda. Throughout his six decades in Hollywood, Henry Fonda maintained his image of a strong, charming man in films that became Hollywood classics In 1999, Henry Fonda was named sixth on AFI's list of the 100 Greatest Movie Stars of 100 Years by the American Film Institute.)
Henry William Ellingham ((1896-2009) English centenarian, one of the very last veterans of the First World War and the oldest verified living man on Earth)

O. Henry (English O. Henry, pseudonym, real name William Sydney Porter - English William Sydney Porter; 1862-1910) - American writer, prose writer, author of popular short stories characterized by subtle humor and unexpected endings.

William Sidney Porter was born on September 11, 1862 in Greensboro, North Carolina. At the age of three, he lost his mother, who died of tuberculosis. Later he came under the care of his paternal aunt. After school, I studied to become a pharmacist and worked in a pharmacy. Then he worked as a cashier-accountant in a bank in the Texas city of Austin. He was accused of embezzlement and hid from law enforcement for six months in Honduras, then in South America. Upon returning to the United States, he was convicted and sent to prison in Columbus, Ohio, where he spent three years (1898-1901).

It's not about the roads we choose, but what's inside us that makes us choose our roads.

In prison, Porter worked in the infirmary and wrote stories, looking for a pseudonym. In the end, I decided on the version of O. Henry (often incorrectly spelled like the Irish surname O'Henry - O'Henry). Its origin is not entirely clear. The writer himself claimed in an interview that the name Henry was taken from the society news column in the newspaper, and the initial O. was chosen as the simplest letter. He told one of the newspapers that O. stands for Olivier (the French name Olivier), and indeed, he published several stories there under the name Olivier Henry. According to other sources, this is the name of the famous French pharmacist Etienne Ocean Henry, whose medical reference book was popular at that time. Another hypothesis was put forward by writer and scientist Guy Davenport: “Oh. Henry" is nothing more than an abbreviation of the name of the prison where the author was imprisoned - Ohio Penitentiary. He wrote his first story under this pseudonym, “Dick the Whistler's Christmas Gift,” published in 1899 in McClure's Magazine.

O. Henry's first book of stories, Cabbages and Kings, was published in 1904. It was followed by The four million (1906), The trimmed lamp (1907), “Heart of the West” (1907), “The Voice of the City” (1908), “The Gentle Grafter” (1908), “Roads of Destiny” (1909) , Options (1909), Strictly Business (1910) and Whirlliggs (1910). At the end of his life he suffered from cirrhosis of the liver and diabetes. The writer died on June 5, 1910 in New York.

The collection “Postscripts”, published after the death of O. Henry, included feuilletons, sketches and humorous notes written by him for the newspaper “Post” (Houston, Texas, 1895-1896). In total, O. Henry wrote 273 stories, the complete collection of his works is 18 volumes. O. Henry occupies an exceptional place in American literature as a master of the short-story genre. Before his death, O. Henry expressed his intention to move on to a more complex genre - to the novel (“everything I have written so far is just self-indulgence, a test of the pen, compared to what I will write in a year”).

In his work, however, these sentiments did not manifest themselves in any way, and O. Henry remained an organic artist of the “small” genre, the story. It is no coincidence, of course, that during this period the writer first began to be interested in social problems and revealed his negative attitude towards bourgeois society (Jennings “Through the Darkness with O. Henry”).

O. Henry's heroes are diverse: millionaires, cowboys, speculators, clerks, laundresses, bandits, financiers, politicians, writers, artists, artists, workers, engineers, firefighters - they replace each other. A skillful plot designer, O. Henry does not show the psychological side of what is happening; the actions of his characters do not receive deep psychological motivation, which further enhances the surprise of the ending.

O. Henry is not the first original master of the “short story”; he only developed this genre, which in its main features had already taken shape in the work of T. B. Aldrich (Thomas Bailey Aldrich, 1836-1907). O. Henry's originality was manifested in the brilliant use of jargon, sharp words and expressions, and in the general colorfulness of the dialogues. Already during the writer’s lifetime, the “short story” in his style began to degenerate into a scheme, and by the 1920s it turned into a purely commercial phenomenon: the “method” of its production was taught in colleges and universities, numerous manuals were published, etc.

O. HENRY (O. Henry; pseudonym, real name - William Sidney Porter, Porter) (1862–1910), American writer. Born September 11, 1862 in Greensboro (North Carolina). At the age of twenty he moved to Texas and settled in Austin. Having changed many professions (pharmacist, cowboy, salesman, etc.), he became a cashier at the First National Bank, while simultaneously practicing journalism. In July 1887 he married Atol Este. In 1896, suspected of embezzlement, he fled to Honduras, where he awaited the arrival of his wife and little daughter. However, Athol was dying of tuberculosis, and in 1897 Porter returned to Austin. A year later, he was found guilty and sentenced to five years in prison (he spent a total of three and a half years in prison).

While fulfilling his duties as a prison pharmacist, Porter got the opportunity to engage in literature and began publishing under the pseudonym O. Henry. When Porter was released in July 1901, he already had his own readership. He moved to New York, lived large and was constantly in debt to his publishers. For this reason, his most productive years were 1904–1905, when he wrote a story a day for the Sunday World, and wrote unevenly, sacrificing artistic truth for the sake of entertainment. Perhaps the most accurate picture of O. Henry’s work is given by the collection The Four Million (1909), which includes such beloved stories as The Gift of the Magi, The Furnished Room, Gold and love (Mammon and the Archer). The action of the satirical novel in the short stories Cabbages and Kings (1904) takes place in Central America, the collection The Heart of the West (1907) - on Texas ranches, and The Voice of the City (1908) - in his beloved New York. In 1907, Porter remarried, but by that time he had become a complete alcoholic, and the marriage soon broke up. Porter died in New York on June 5, 1910.

O. Henry [pseudonym; real name - William Sidney Porter (September 11, 1862 - July 5, 1910) - American writer, author of more than 280 stories, sketches, humoresques.

William Sidney Porter was born in Greensboro, North. Carolina, USA. His life was sad since childhood. When he was three years old, he lost his mother. The father, a poor provincial doctor, started drinking as a widower and quickly turned into a worthless alcoholic.

After dropping out of school, 15-year-old Billy Porter stood behind a pharmacy counter. Working surrounded by cough syrups and flea powders had a very detrimental effect on his already poor health. Four years later, he went to a ranch in Texas to recover. But unlike his character, the consumptive boxer McGuire, he did not become a dashing cowboy beater. A quiet, self-educated, well-mannered and very reserved city dweller aroused respect from rude, illiterate guys - many even trusted him with their heartfelt secrets.

He was the same in his service - in a tobacco shop, in the land department, in the cash desk of the First National Bank in the provincial town of Austin, Texas.

Little good came out of my banking career. Porter was soon accused of embezzling $1,150, a very significant sum at that time. The writer's biographers are still arguing whether he was actually guilty. On the one hand, he needed money to treat his sick wife (and for the publication of Rolling Stone). On the other hand, Cashier Porter resigned from the bank in December 1894, while the embezzlement was revealed only in 1895, and the owners of the bank were clearly dishonest.

Be that as it may, a criminal case was opened against Porter, and in February 1896 he fled in panic to New Orleans, and from there to Honduras. In this country, fate brought Porter together with a pleasant gentleman - professional bandit-raider Al Jennings.

Much later, Jennings, putting down his revolver, took up his pen and created a memoir in which he recalled interesting episodes of Latin American adventures. The friends took part in the local Honduran coup, then fled to Mexico, where Jennings saved the future writer from certain death. Porter carelessly made love to a certain married beauty; The beauty's husband, a real Mexican macho, who was hanging around nearby, took out a knife with a blade two feet long and wanted to defend his violated honor. Jennings settled the situation - with a shot from the hip he took off half the head of the jealous man, after which fresh, rested horses took over, and the conflict was left far behind. In Mexico, Porter received a telegram about the hopeless condition of his beloved wife, Atoll Estes. In the absence of her husband, starving and not receiving any treatment, on Christmas Eve she managed to sell a lace cape for $25 and send Bill a gift in Mexico City - a gold watch chain. Alas, just at that moment Porter sold his watch to buy a train ticket to the border. He managed to see and say goodbye to his wife. A few days later she died. Police agents wearing mourning bands walked silently behind the coffin. Immediately after the burial, they arrested the cashier-embezzler, who did not utter a word in court and received 5 years in prison. Porter spent 3 years and 3 months in prison. He was released early (for exemplary behavior and good work in the prison pharmacy) in the summer of 1901. He never remembered his prison years with a single word. The memories of Al Jennings helped, who, ironically, again found himself side by side with the writer in a convict prison in Columbus, Ohio. Sitting with Porter and Jennings was 20-year-old “safecracker” Dick Price. He did a good deed - he saved the little daughter of a wealthy businessman from a slammed safe. Price cut off his nails with a knife and opened the top-secret lock in 12 seconds. They promised him a pardon, but they deceived him. Based on this plot, Porter composed his first story - about the burglar Jimmy Valentine, who saved his fiancee's niece from a fireproof cabinet. The story, unlike Dick Price's story, ended with a happy ending. Before sending the story to the newspaper, Porter read it to his fellow inmates. Al Jennings recalled: “From the moment Porter began to read in his low, velvety, slightly stuttering voice, dead silence reigned. We positively froze, holding our breath. Finally, the robber Raidler sighed loudly, and Porter, as if awakening from a dream, looked at us Raidler grinned and began to rub his eyes with his crippled hand. - Damn you, Porter, this is the first time in my life. God bless me if I knew what a tear looks like!" The story was not immediately accepted for publication. The next three were published under a pseudonym. While in prison, Porter was ashamed to publish under his own name. In a pharmacy reference book, he came across the name of the then famous French pharmacist O. Henry. It was her, in the same transcription, but in English pronunciation - O. Henry - that the writer chose as his pseudonym for the rest of his life. Coming out of the prison gates, he uttered a phrase that has been quoted for a good century: “Prisons could have a certain effect service to society, if society chose who to put there." At the end of 1903, O. Henry signed a contract with the New York newspaper "World" for the weekly delivery of a short Sunday story - for $ 100 a piece. This fee at that time was very good. The writer's annual income was equal to the income of popular American novelists. But the feverish pace of work could kill a healthier person than O. Henry, who, due to his character, did not refuse other periodicals. In 1904, O. Henry published 66 stories, in 1905 - 64. Sometimes, sitting in the editorial office, he would finish writing two stories at once, and the editorial artist would shift nearby, waiting for him to start illustrating. Readers of American newspapers could not cope with long texts and could not stand philosophizing and tragic stories. O. Henry began to run out of stories, and he increasingly borrowed or even bought them from friends and acquaintances. Gradually he got tired and slowed down. Nevertheless, 273 stories were published from his pen - more than 30 per year. The stories enriched newspapermen and publishers, but not O. Henry himself - impractical, accustomed to a semi-bohemian life. He never bargained, never found out anything. He silently received his money, thanked him and left: “I owe Mr. Gilman Hall, according to him, 175 dollars. I think I owe him no more than 30 dollars. But he knows how to keep accounts, and I can’t...” He avoided the company of literary brothers, sought solitude, shunned social gatherings, and did not give interviews. He wandered around New York for several days without any apparent goal, then locked the door of his room and wrote. In his wanderings and hermitage, he recognized and “digested” the big city, Babylon-on-Hudson, Baghdad-over-the-Subway - its sounds and lights, hopes and tears, sensations and failures. He was a poet of the New York bottom and the lower rungs of the social ladder, a dreamer and visionary of brick back streets. In the dull quarters of Harlem and Coney Island, by the will of O. Henry, Cinderellas and Don Quixotes, Haruns of al-Rashid and Diogenes appeared, always ready to come to the aid of the desperate and dying in order to provide a realistic story with an unexpected ending. O. Henry spent the last weeks of his life alone in a squalid hotel room. He became ill, drank a lot, and could no longer work. At the 48th year of his life in a New York hospital, he left for another world, unlike his heroes, never receiving miraculous help from above. The writer's funeral resulted in a real Henryian plot. During the funeral service, a cheerful wedding party burst into the church and did not immediately realize that they would have to wait on the porch.

William Sidney Porter was born on September 11, 1862 in Greensboro, North Carolina. After school, I studied to become a pharmacist and worked in a pharmacy. Then he worked as a cashier-accountant in a bank in the Texas city of Austin. He was accused of embezzlement and hid from law enforcement for six months in Honduras, then in South America. Returning to the United States, he was convicted and sent to Ohio State Prison, where he spent three years (1898-1901). In prison he wrote stories, looking for a pseudonym. In the end I decided on O. Henry's version. He wrote his first story under this pseudonym, “Dick the Whistler's Christmas Gift,” published in 1899 in McClure's Magazine. This nickname is often incorrectly spelled like the Irish surname O'Henry. O. Henry's first book of stories - “Cabbages and Kings” - was published in 1904. It was followed by: “The four million” (The four million, 1906), “The trimmed Lamp” (1907), “Heart of the West” (1907), “The Voice of the City” (1908), “The Gentle Grafter” (1908), “Roads of Destiny” (1909) , Options (1909), Strictly Business (1910) and Whirlliggs (1910). The writer died on June 5, 1910 in New York.

O. Henry (real name William Sidney Porter) - American writer, recognized master of the short story - was born September 11, 1862 in Greensboro (North Carolina) in the family of a doctor.

At the age of three, he lost his mother, who died of tuberculosis, and was raised by his paternal aunt, who was the owner of a private school. After school (at the age of 16), he began working as a salesman and pharmacist in his uncle's pharmacy. He learned quickly and received his pharmacist's license within a year.

Three years later he left for Texas, as he had serious symptoms of tuberculosis and needed a change of climate. There, the son of Dr. Hall’s acquaintance, Richard Hall, lived on the ranch, helped with work (once or twice a week he brought mail from the town of Conulla, helped with preparing food for the cowboys), but did not work, did not receive a salary and did not pay for food and shelter. Two years later, having recovered and become stronger, he moved to the city of Austin (Texas); tried different professions: worked as an accountant in a real estate company, as a draftsman in the land department, then worked as a cashier and bookkeeper in a bank in the Texas city of Austin.

The first literary experiments were by the early 1880s. In April 1894 Porter begins publishing the humorous weekly The Rolling Stone in Austin, filling it almost entirely with his own essays, jokes, poems and drawings. A year later, the magazine closed due to a lack of funds, in December Porter was fired from the bank and brought to court in connection with the shortage (a shady case, the bank kept almost no records, money was sometimes taken from the cash register even without the knowledge of the cashier, out of a $6,000 shortage 5500 were returned by the owners of the bank, they also testified in favor of Porter at the trial, 500 dollars were contributed by the relatives of Rocha’s wife). After being accused of embezzlement, he hid from law enforcement officers in Honduras (South America) for six months. Came back in January 1897, in order to care for his sick wife (still with the same fatal tuberculosis). In July she passed away. In February 1898 was convicted of embezzlement and sent to prison in Columbus, Ohio ( March 1898), where he spent three years and four days ( 1898-1901 ). His prison number was 30664.

In prison, Porter worked in the infirmary as a pharmacist (a rare profession in prison) and wrote stories, looking for a pseudonym. In the end, he chose the version of O. Henry (often incorrectly spelled like the Irish surname O'Henry - O'Henry). Its origin is not entirely clear. The writer himself claimed in an interview that the name Henry was taken from the society news column in the newspaper, and the initial O. was chosen as the simplest letter. He told one of the newspapers that O. stands for Olivier (the French name Olivier), and indeed, he published several stories there under the name Olivier Henry. According to other sources, this is the name of the famous French pharmacist Etienne Ocean Henry, whose medical reference book was popular at that time. Another hypothesis was put forward by writer and scientist Guy Davenport: “Oh. Henry" is nothing more than an abbreviation of the name of the prison where the author was imprisoned - Ohio Penitentiary (Ohio State Penitentiary). Also known as the Arena District, which burned to the ground on April 21, 1930.

Al Jennings, who was in prison with Porter and became famous as the author of the book “Through the Dark with O. Henry” (there is an option to translate the title “With O. Henry at the Bottom”), reports in his book that the pseudonym was taken from a famous cowboy song , where there are the following lines: “My beloved returned at 12 o’clock. Tell me, O Henry, what is the sentence?”

There is an opinion that “The famous American writer W. Porter took the pseudonym O. Henry in honor of the physicist J. Henry, whose name was constantly uttered with admiration by the school teacher: “Oh! Henry! It was he who discovered that the discharge of a capacitor through a coil is oscillatory in nature!” His first story under this pseudonym was “Dick the Whistler’s Christmas Gift,” published in 1899 in McClure's Magazine, he wrote in prison.

O. Henry's only novel, Cabbages and Kings, was published in 1904(which is not a novel, but a collection of short stories, ostensibly united by a common setting). It was followed by collections of stories: “The Four Million” (the number of residents of the then New York) (The Four Million, 1906 ), “The Trimmed Lamp”, 1907 ), “Heart of the West” (Heart of the West, 1907 ), “The Voice of the City”, 1908 ), "The Gentle Grafter" 1908 ), "Roads of Destiny" 1909 ), “Favorites” (Options, 1909 ), "Business People" (Strictly Business, 1910 ) and "Whirligigs" 1910 ).

Late in his life, Porter suffered from cirrhosis of the liver and diabetes.

O. Henry died June 5, 1910 in New York at the age of 47. He was buried in Asheville, North Carolina, at Riverside Cemetery.

Eight years after his death, the O. Henry Prize was established in memory of the writer, which is awarded annually.

Works:
"Kings and Cabbages" (novel)

Collections of stories:
"Four million", 1906
"Burning Lamp" 1907
"Heart of the West" 1907
"Noble rogue" 1908
"Voice of the Big City" 1908
"Roads of Destiny" 1909
"To choose from" 1909
"Rotation" 1910
"Business people", 1910
"Sixes and Sevens" 1910
"Under a lying stone" 1910
“Leftovers” or “A Little Bit of Everything” 1910

Joseph Henry is famous primarily for the fact that, having become fascinated by the “secrets” of electromagnetism, he became the creator of unique, powerful electromagnets with a fantastic lifting force - from 30 to 1500 kg with a magnet’s own weight of 10 kg. One of his electromagnets, created in 1831, capable of lifting 1000 kg is now kept in the Smithsonian Institution in Washington.

In general, Joseph Henry was a very versatile scientist and he was interested not only in powerful electromagnets. I think that many blog readers will be interested in getting acquainted with the biography of this extraordinary person

Joseph Henry was born in Albany, New York. As a child, Joseph Henry had no intention of becoming a physicist-inventor. After leaving school in Galway, he studied at the Evening Academy in Albany, intending to become a doctor, but he discovered a talent as an experimenter, and while studying at the Academy, he assisted in conducting chemical experiments. During his summer holidays he worked on the construction of the road between Kingston and Lake Erie. In 1826, Henry was appointed instructor of mathematics and science at the Academy in Albany and soon began experimenting with electromagnets.

He summarized the results of the experiments in the work “Some modifications of an electromagnetic device,” which he read at the Albany Academy in 1827, earning a reputation as an outstanding experimenter. He insulated an electrical conductor with silk from his wife's wedding dress, winding it in several layers and thereby significantly increasing the strength of the electromagnet, giving it the now well-known configuration.

After hard work, he succeeded in 1830, using one long and several short conductors, to determine the optimal dimensions of the magnet and battery necessary to obtain the maximum effect. This was the first demonstration of Ohm's theory of the need to include appropriate resistances in individual parts of an electrical circuit.

Its parallel-connected magnets aroused great interest. The strongest of them held a mass of 3,500 pounds (approximately 1,575 kg). In 1831, Henry strung a 1-mile (1,609.3 m) wire around his auditorium, and when he used a strong magnet and a suitable battery, the bell at the other end of the wire rang. This was the first demonstration of a telegraph with an audible signal.

In the same year, he designed a model of an electric motor with a swinging motion of an “electromagnet-rocker arm” that made 75 uniform swings per minute. And although his movement was more reciprocal than rotational, he still solved the problem of converting electrical energy into mechanical energy.

The discovery of the phenomenon of mutual induction is independently attributed to Henry and Michael Faraday, but Henry was irresponsibly slow in publishing the results of the experiments, and Faraday was the first to report his success. Finally, priority was given to the discovery of mutual induction by Faraday, and Henry was given the discovery of the phenomenon of self-induction, which he described in the same article as the phenomenon of induction, in 1832.

In 1832, already a recognized scientist, Henry was invited to the position of professor of natural sciences at the College of New Jersey (now Princeton University), where he continued his research in electromagnetism. Henry was the first to discover the oscillatory nature of the spark discharge of a capacitor, which was appreciated only half a century later with the birth of telecommunications and radio engineering. In lectures for the American Philosophical Society, he reported on the invention of the electric relay, the non-inductive winding and the ability, with the appropriate choice of turns, to increase or decrease the voltage, which was the basis for the creation of the transformer, i.e. the discoveries and inventions made by Joseph Henry underlie the work of the absolute most electrical devices

He later described the variation of inductance between individual turns, the effect of inductance over a distance, and the oscillatory nature of the electrical discharge of a Leyden jar - a combination of discoveries that were vital to the emergence of radiotelegraphy and radio broadcasting.

It is interesting that already in 1835. In his laboratory, Henry demonstrated the first electric telegraph. He transmitted a message via wire to a nearby building. But again, Henry, as in the case of Faraday, was betrayed by modesty. He did not publish his results, and the inventor of the telegraph is now considered to be Samuel Morse, who invented it 2 years later. At the same time, Morse (his engineering training was modest) did not hesitate to consult Henry on the technical problems of the telegraph and after that he immediately patented what Henry advised him.

Henry conducted a number of studies in other areas. For example, he made numerous meteorological observations.

By the 40s of the 19th century, Henry had become the most authoritative American scientist. In 1846, he became secretary of the Smithsonian Institution. Not only did he perform official duties, but he also organized a telegraphic weather agency, compiled the first weather map, and laid the foundations for scientific methods of weather forecasting.

Henry also did a lot of useful things for the safety of navigation; through his efforts the effectiveness of fog signals and beacons was increased. His participation in various government projects was also significant; he was responsible for the discovery of many phenomena in acoustics and testing of building materials.

In 1868 he became president of the National Academy of Sciences and remained so until the end of his life. In 1886, a collection of his works entitled “The Scientific Works of Joseph Henry” was published. Henry died on May 13, 1878 in Washington.

Henry's scientific contribution to the treasury of knowledge received the highest praise: in 1893, at the Electrical Engineering Congress in Chicago, the unit of inductance was named “Henry”.

From the article: A century and a quarter and a whole era in the field of knowledge separated Franklin's electrostatics and Maxwell's electrodynamics. And most of this knowledge was obtained by one person - J. Henry... Most of his contemporaries could not properly appreciate even a small part of his enormous contribution to science. Now his research ranks among the great scientific discoveries.” J. Henry's outstanding contribution to the study of electromagnetism is considered to be his discovery (almost simultaneously with Faraday) of the phenomenon of electromagnetic induction. It is no coincidence that he is called the “American Faraday.” ... Although thousands of people every fine day in Mall Square in Washington linger in front of the monument to Joseph Henry, erected in front of the old Smithsonian Institution building ... it may seem implausible, but it is true that only a few of them know for sure who he is and what did he do.

- article about how Michael Faraday made one of the most significant discoveries in electrical engineering. During his experiments in 1830, Joseph Henry discovered the phenomenon of electromagnetic induction a whole year before Faraday! But if Faraday immediately published the results of his experiments (London was then the scientific center of the world), then Henry, in the distant American outback, did not do this immediately and therefore lost priority.