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Birth
Edgar Poe is born in Boston to his parents Elizabeth Arnold Poe and David Poe, Jr.; both were traveling actors. -
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Life and Death
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Rosalie is born
Rosalie is the sister to Poe and Henry. Henry is the oldest. -
Parents death
Elizabeth Arnold Poe dies of tuberculosis in Richmond, Virginia. David Poe then dies of tuberculosis. The three children of the family are split up. Henry is sent to live with his paternal grandparents. A Richmond couple, John and Frances Allan, take in Edgar as a foster child. Rosalie is taken in by another Richmond family named Mackenzie. Both Edgar and Rosalie adopt their foster families' names as their middle names. -
First Book
At fifteen years old, Poe creates his first poem. "Last night, with many cares & toils oppres'd,/ Weary, I laid me on a couch to rest." -
Poe enrolls in college
Poe enrolls midway through the academic year at the University of Virginia, which had opened less than a year before. -
Army and First Publised Book.
Poe enlists in the U.S. Army under the name "Edgar A. Perry." Shortly after, his first book—a poetry collection entitled Tamerlane and Other Poems—is published. The author is listed only as "A Bostonian." -
Foster Mother Dies
Poe's foster mother, Frances Allan, with whom he was still close, dies in Richmond. Poe—by now a sergeant major in the Army—obtains leave to travel to her funeral. -
Southern Literary Messanger
Poe takes a job as editor of the Southern Literary Messenger magazine. He publishes critical reviews of other writers' work as well as his own stories and poems. -
Poe as a Magazine Editor
Poe is hired as an editor at Burton's Gentleman's Magazine, a job he holds until June 1840. He publishs two volumes, "Tales of the Grotesque" and "Arabesque." -
Poe edits fr the Graham's Magazine
Poe begins as an editor at Graham's Magazine, where he works until May 1842. The magazine runs Poe's short story "The Murders in the Rue Morgue," the first-ever entry in a genre now known as the detective story. -
"Nevermore"
Poe publishes the poem , The Raven in the New York Evening Mirror. It is wildly successful, bringing the writer the fame and fortune that have long eluded him. He soon becomes editor and owner of a magazine called the Broadway Journal, a doomed enterprise that is already in debt when Poe takes over. -
Death of His Wife
Poe's wife Virginia dies of tuberculosis at their home in the Bronx. Poe has been so despondent during the final months of her illness that friends thought he was going insane. -
Depresion
The loss of his wife sends Poe into a downward spiral of alcoholism. Th loss of his sister, wife, mother, and father might make him wite the morbid poems -
Death
After being found unconscious in a Baltimore gutter, Edgar Allan Poe is taken to the hospital and pronounced dead of causes still unknown. He is buried at Westminster Presbyterian Church in Baltimore.
