David L. Cohn (1896-1960)

(click photograph for larger image)

The following is from The Caswell Messenger, June 23, 1976 at 3-A (“Remembering” by Former Editor-Publisher, Erwin D. Stephens):

David Cohn, writer and lecturer, also resided in the county for quite some time, writing his books. He began one book about the Mississippi by saying the “Mississippi delta begins in the lobby of the Peabody Hotel in Memphis and extends to Vicksburg.” One book he produced at Yanceyville was “The Good Old Days” and quite a number of copies were bought by Caswell people.

Life magazine in its December 8, 1941, edition provided the following as a caption under a photograph included in the article “The Yanceyville Card Game Is Ended by Law” (at page 60):

“Forest Home,” famous homestead near Yanceyville, was once home of Playwright Laurence Stallings’ wife. Author David Cohn (The Good Old Days) now lives there.

David L. Cohn (1896-1960), born in Greenville, Mississippi, graduated from the University of Virginia and took his Master of Laws at Yale. "Then," he writes, "I went into business -- instead of into writing -- because my family went bust on a cotton plantation they had bought. I had a successful business career in New Orleans, rising as they say, to the head of a large mercantile corporation. In 1934 I quit in order to write. In the meantime I had managed to attend the late war in a highly minor capacity and to travel extensively from Turkey to Tahiti." Between 1935 and 1960, Cohn produced ten books including his best known, God Shakes Creation, later expanded into Where I Was Born and Raised -- and scores of articles and essays, including more than sixty such pieces in The Atlantic Monthly. He is also author of Picking America's Pockets.
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THE GOOD OLD DAYS (A History of American Morals and Manners as seen through the Sears, Roebuck Catalogs 1905 to the Present), David L. Cohn (1940). To read this book online click on the title.

The Life and Times of King Cotton, David L. Cohn (1956).

The Mississippi Delta and the World: The Memoirs of David L. Cohn, David L. Cohn (Author), James C. Cobb (Editor) (1995).

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