Born August 25, 1836
Albany, New York

Died May 5, 1902
Camberley, England

Writer and editor

Bret Harte. AP/Wide World Photos. Reproduced by permission.

"The only sure thing about luck is that it will change."

In 1868, Bret Harte burst onto the literary scene as a popular writer of tales set in California mining camps and boomtowns and as the founding editor of a new magazine called Overland Monthly. By 1871, he signed the highest paying publishing contract in American history to that time. Harte was known as a satirist (a writer who uses a humorous tone to criticize human characteristics) and a writer who specialized in regional stories. He carefully recreated distinct California settings, speech patterns of people drawn to mining districts, and details of clothing and manners from people of high society to everyday men and women trying to get rich or find work. Harte himself experienced the boom...