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THE 
 
 OF THE 
 
 CITY OF SOMERVILLE 
 
 SAM WALTER FOSS 
 
 Poet, Librarian and 
 Friend to Man 
 
 Somerville, Mass. 
 1922 
 
By 
 MARY S. WOODMAN 
 

 SAM WALTER FOSS 
 Poet, Librarian and Friend to Man. 
 
 Ten years after the death of Sam Walter 
 Foss, the Public Library of Somerville, Mass., 
 of which he was for thirteen years Librarian, 
 is receiving frequent requests for information 
 about the life of the man whose poems have 
 carried good cheer and good fellowship to 
 thousands. In response to these requests the 
 Library offers this little sketch of Mr. Foss, 
 giving the simple facts of his life, and some 
 suggestions of his spirit and character as felt 
 by those associated with him in his work. 
 
 Sam Walter Foss was born in Candia, 
 N. H., June 19, 1858. He was the son of 
 Dyer and Polly (Hardy) Foss, and was 
 named for his grandfathers, Sam Hardy and 
 Walter Foss. 
 
 The first fourteen years of his life were 
 spent in Candia, where he worked on his 
 father's farm as soon as he was old enough, 
 going to school in the winter. The High 
 School at Portsmouth, which he walked three 
 miles to attend, and a year at Tilton Semi- 
 nary prepared him for Brown University 
 which he entered in 1878. 
 
On leaving college he, with another young 
 man took up book canvassing, that traditional 
 resort of the poor scholar. The work 
 w^as not much to his liking, and always in 
 after life he had a fellow - feeling and a 
 cheering word for any canvasser that came 
 his way. One of the most touching tributes 
 after his death was that of a book agent who 
 sat in the Library office where he had so often 
 brought his wares, and told with tears run- 
 ning down his face of Mr. Foss's kindness to 
 him. 
 
 The creation, not the purveying, of liter- 
 ature was his calling, and the young men 
 soon forsook the road for the editorial office. 
 They bought the Lynn L^nion, of Lynn, Mass., 
 changing the name to the Saturday Union. 
 This he edited for several years, and here 
 began his reputation as "Funny Man." The 
 venture was not a financial success, but 
 through its columns he attracted the atten- 
 tion of other humorists, and he was soon 
 contributing regularly to Tid-bits, Puck, 
 Judge, The New York Sun and other New 
 York papers. 
 
 In 1887 he came to Boston and became the 
 editor of the Yankee Blade, and editorial 
 writer for the Boston Globe. Each issue of 
 the Yankee Blade contained a poem by him, 
 many of which have been gathered togeth- 
 er in his published works. In the seven years 
 of his editorship the weekly circulation of the 
 paper became 130,000. He also wrote regu- 
 
larly for the Christian Endeavor World and 
 the Youth's Companion. 
 
 At the end of this period he gave up edi- 
 torial work and devoted his time to writing, 
 reading from his own poems, and lecturing. 
 This was perhaps the most fruitful period of 
 his life. 
 
 Between 1892 and 1907 he published "Back 
 Country Poems," "Whiffs from Wild Mead- 
 oAvs," "Dreams in Homespun," "Songs of War 
 and Peace," and "Songs of the Average Man." 
 
 On settling in Boston he married Miss 
 Carrie M. Conant of Providence, R. I., and 
 made his home in Somerville. Here were 
 born his two children, Saxton Conant and 
 Mary Lillian Foss. Seven years after his 
 death, Saxton, too, heard the call of "The 
 Trumpets," and following the spirit and 
 teaching of his father, won glory and death 
 on the fields of France. 
 
 In 1898 he became Librarian of the Som- 
 erville Public Library, Somerville, Mass., 
 which office he held for thirteen years, until 
 his death. The Library and the community 
 soon felt the impress of his personality and 
 his ideals. Progress and development, liber- 
 al policy and whole-hearted service marked 
 his professional activities; while his genial- 
 ity and wide sympathy created an atmosphere 
 which Library patrons characterized as home- 
 like. 
 
 In December, 1916, nearly five years after 
 his death, a bronze memorial tablet was 
 
placed in the Somerville Public Library. Ii 
 consists of a life-size medallion of Mr. Fass, 
 with loose sheets of manuscript on each side, 
 ane of which contains a verse of "The 
 House by the Side of the Road," and the 
 other lines from the poet's tribute to Presi- 
 dent McKinley. 
 
 "A man who was made of the clay 
 And built of the stufif of to-day, 
 A man who came up from the throng, 
 Came up from the weak and was strong 
 And sweet as the breath of the hay." 
 
 Somerville did not confine his activities 
 nor his fame. He was a well-known and al- 
 ways welcome figure in library circles and 
 he was first secretary and then president of 
 the Massachusetts Library Club. For several 
 months before his death he carried on a 
 column in The Christian Science Monitor of 
 Boston, called "The Library Alcove," and his 
 last contribution, written in the hospital while 
 awaiting his operation, was on "Optimism." 
 
 Mr. Foss died Feb. 26, 1911, after two 
 years of suffering through which he battled 
 bravely, going to his library only two days 
 before the operation which failed to save his 
 life. 
 
 "Somerville's best loved citizen" was the 
 caption in the morning papers. The estimate 
 of his character in widelv scattered tributes 
 was a variation on the same adjectives — 
 
sunny, hopeful, helpful, friendly. "I never 
 heard him speak a cross word" is the state- 
 ment of those who knew him in bus'ness life 
 or home. He was essentially a home-lover — 
 "A good domestic man" — travelling only for 
 his lectures and readings. He never crossed 
 the ocean, a fact which disposes of the myth 
 of the European origin of "The House by the 
 Side of the Road." Indeed, it had no specific 
 origin outside of his own friendly spirit and 
 a line of his beloved Homer, "He was a 
 friend to man, and lived in a house by 
 the side of the road." The poem itself, how- 
 ever, has travelled the world over, having 
 been translated into several languages. 
 
 His universality of spirit made him a be- 
 liever in all progressive measures. "I be- 
 lieve in woman suffrage," he once said to 
 the writer, "because I believe in democracv." 
 
 Mr. Foss was a member of many clubs. At 
 college he belonged to the Beta Theta Pi 
 fraternity and won the coveted Phi Beta Kap- 
 pa key. In later life he joined the Twentieth 
 Century, Authors and Economic clubs of 
 Boston, the Boston Browning Club, th«} 
 Puddingstone Club, the Central Club of Som- 
 erville, the Massachusetts Library Club, 
 Somerville Sons and Daughters of Nev7 
 Hampshire, and was the founder and first 
 president of the Candia Club. This last was 
 an outgrowth of Old Home week, with a 
 branch in Boston, and its crowning glory is 
 the name of Sam Walter Foss. 
 
Mr. Foss's poetry was largely of the "news- 
 paper" type. Common sense, optimism, "the 
 joy of going on," truth and philosophy often 
 hidden in humor and dialect — these are itr 
 outstanding characteristics. That there is 
 real poetry also becomes more evident at 
 every reading, and the groundwork of wide 
 knowledge and deep thinking gives his verse 
 a staying quality not common to newspaper 
 poets. 
 
 "Foss w-rites poems that men cut out and 
 carry about in their pockets," writes a West- 
 ern editor, "common everyday men, mind 
 you, who find in his rhymes something that 
 appeals to them powerfully." 
 
 A friend once remonstrated with him for 
 "preaching" in his poetry. His answer was, 
 "If any of my poetry lives, it will be because 
 of that very quality." 
 
 He would have been the last to claim the 
 title of a "Great poet," yet who has better 
 exemplified the description in the dedicatory 
 verse to his "Back Country poems?" 
 
 " 'Tis not the greatest singer 
 Who tries the loftiest themes, 
 He is the true joy bringer 
 Who tells his simplest dreams." 
 
 PD 177 
 

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