Francis A. (Francis Alexander) Durivage

Francis Alexander Durivage was an American author from Boston, born in 1814 and active across several kinds of writing. Contemporary reference sources describe him as a prolific contributor of poems, humorous articles, short stories, and magazine sketches, and note that he often signed this work with the pen name Old Un.

He also worked beyond short magazine writing. Sources credit him with translating Alphonse de Lamartine’s History of the Revolution of 1848 with W. S. Chase, collaborating with George P. Burnham on Stray Subjects arrested and bound over (1848), and serving for a time as co-editor of Ballou’s Pictorial. He published other books as well, including A Cyclopaedia of History (1836) and Life Scenes from the World around Us (1853).

Durivage died in 1881. Even in brief biographical records, he comes across as one of those energetic literary figures who seemed ready to write almost anything for a growing 19th-century reading public.