Today in Savannah history August 5, 1889 Conrad Aiken was born here. He and his 3 other siblings lived with their mother and father at 228 East Oglethorpe Avenue just across from Colonial Park Cemetery. February 27, 1901 Aiken’s father killed his mother and then himself. The tragic event caused Aiken to move to Massachusetts with family. He attended Harvard for his schooling where he started writing his poetry. He suffered from mental trauma and his marriages were doomed. He married Jesse MacDonald in 1912 and they were divorced by the 1920s. His second wife was Clarissa M. Lorenz and that didn’t last more than a decade. She even wrote a book entitled Lorelei Two: My life with Conrad Aiken describing his mental decline. His third wife was Mary Hoover. He wrote an autobiography entitled Ushant that also described his traumatic childhood. He moved back to Savannah in the 1960s and lived in the house next door to his childhood home at 230 East Oglethorpe Avenue. He was made Poet Laureate just before he passed on August 17, 1973. He rests eternally in Bonaventure Cemetery next to the graves of his parents. He visited them often enough in life to erect a bench at the grave site.
Posted on: Mon, 05 Aug 2013 16:00:00 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015