American storyteller born in Greensboro, North Carolina, whose production of romanticized short stories often with unforeseen endings that became his trademark and made him one of the most popular authors of his time. From a well-educated and wealthy family, his mother died of tuberculosis when he was three years old and was raised by an aunt. He started working as an apothecary's apprentice at age fifteen and then moved to Texas (1882) where he worked on a cattle ranch.
He got married and got a job as a teller at a Bank of Austin, while trying to write comedy. He bought a newspaper, the comedy magazine The Rolling Stone (1894), but the project failed and he went on to work as a reporter, columnist and cartoonist for the Houston Post.
Accused of embezzlement at the Bank (1896), he fled alone to Honduras, but returned to Austin three years later, hearing of his wife's terminal illness. A widower, he was sentenced to three years in prison in an Ohio penitentiary, during which time he wrote short stories under various pseudonyms until he defined himself by O. Henry.
In freedom he moved to New York (1902), where he continued writing practically one short story a week and militating in the press and, although extremely popular, he lived the rest of his life in seclusion, not to be recognized as William Sydney Porter
He died alcoholic and destitute, in New York, leaving behind several collections of short stories, including Cabbages and Kings (1904), The Four Million (1906), Heart of the West (1907), The Voice of the City (1908) and The Gentle Grafter (1908).
Figure copied from the CITY OF AUSTIN website:
http://www.ci.austin.tx.us/
Source: http://www.dec.ufcg.edu.br/biografias/
Order O - Biography - Brazil School
Source: Brazil School - https://brasilescola.uol.com.br/biografia/william-sydney.htm
