James Parton

Born in Canterbury, England, in 1822 and brought to the United States as a child, James Parton built his career first in journalism and then in biography. His breakthrough came with The Life of Horace Greeley in 1855, and he went on to write widely read lives of Aaron Burr, Andrew Jackson, Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, and Voltaire.

Parton was admired for making historical subjects feel vivid and readable to a broad audience. Later writers and reference works have often described him as a key early shaper of modern biographical writing, especially because he combined extensive research with a strong narrative style.

He spent his later years in Massachusetts and died in Newburyport in 1891. He was also married to the writer Sara Payson Willis, better known as Fanny Fern, linking him to another important literary career of the period.