Jonathan Falconbridge Kelley (August 14, 1817 - July 21, 1855?) was an American journalist and humorist.
He published under a number of pseudonyms, including "Falconbridge", "Jack Humphries", "O.K.", "Cerro Gordo", and "J.F.K."
Kelley was born in Philadelphia in 1817, and later moved west. He started to publish humorous pieces as "Falconbridge" in ''
Spirit of the Times
The ''Spirit of the Times: A Chronicle of the Turf, Agriculture, Field Sports, Literature and the Stage'' was an American weekly newspaper published in New York City. The paper aimed for an upper-class readership made up largely of sportsmen. ...
'' newspaper, and which proved to be popular, in 1844. A posthumous collection of his work containing 111 of his sketches, ''The Humors of Falconbridge'', was published in November 1856.
[(26 November 1856)]
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''New York Tribune'' (advertisement for release "this day" of the ''Humors of Falconbridge'', also states that Kelley wrote under pseudonyms of "Jack Humphries" and "Stampede") He also wrote a biography of comedic actor
Dan Marble
Danforth Marble (April 27, 1810 – May 13, 1849) was an American comedic actor who gained great popularity playing "Yankee" roles in the 1830s and 1840s.
Marble was born in East Windsor, Connecticut and made his stage debut in 1831 at Chatham G ...
in 1851, and briefly published a comedic journal in Boston called ''The Aurora Borealis''. He also had brief attachments to a number of other newspapers. His body of work is largely forgotten today.
Kelley died perhaps of
cholera
Cholera is an infection of the small intestine by some strains of the bacterium ''Vibrio cholerae''. Symptoms may range from none, to mild, to severe. The classic symptom is large amounts of watery diarrhea that lasts a few days. Vomiting and ...
in Cincinnati in 1855 and buried at
Spring Grove Cemetery
Spring Grove Cemetery and Arboretum () is a nonprofit rural cemetery and arboretum located at 4521 Spring Grove Avenue, Cincinnati, Ohio. It is the third largest cemetery in the United States, after the Calverton National Cemetery and Abraham L ...
.
[Hart, James. D]
The Oxford Companion to American Literature
p. 344 (6th ed. 1995)[Wilson, James Grant & John Fiske (eds.]
Appleton's Encyclopaedia of American Biography, Volume 3
p. 508 (1888)
References
External links
*
The Humors of Falconbridge(T.B. Peterson, Philadelphia, 1856)
* Kelley, Jonathan Falconbridge
Dan. Marble: A Biographical Sketch of that Famous and Diverting Humorist, with Reminiscences, Comicalities, Anecdotes, Etc., Etc.(Dewitt & Davenport, 1851) (235 pgs.)
{{DEFAULTSORT:Kelley, Jonathan Falconbridge
1817 births
1855 deaths
American humorists
Deaths from cholera
Writers from Philadelphia
Burials at Spring Grove Cemetery
Infectious disease deaths in Ohio