Books: Songwriter Story

Songwriter Story

STEPHEN FOSTER, AMERICA'S TROUBADOUR—John Tasker Howard—Crowell ($3.50). In a 70-year-old ledger in Manhattan's Bellevue Hospital can be found the record of the death of Stephen Foster. The No. 1 U. S. songwriter, thin and wasted at 37, had fallen in his Bowery rooming-house, cut his throat, bashed his forehead. News papers took scant notice of the passing of the man who wrote "Old Folks at Home," "Massa's in de Cold Ground," "Nelly Ely," "Oh! Susanna," "Old Black Joe," "My Old Kentucky Home." Author John Tasker Howard, an expert on U. S....