Young People's Pride

Stephen Vincent Ben t (July 22, 1898 - March 13, 1943) was an American poet, short story writer, and novelist. He is best known for his book-length narrative poem of the American Civil War John Brown's Body (1928), for which he won a Pulitzer Prize in 1929, and for the short stories "The Devil and Daniel Webster" (1936) and "By the Waters of Babylon" (1937). In 2009, The Library of America selected Ben t's story "The King of the Cats" (1929) for inclusion in its two-century retrospective of American Fantastic Tales edited by Peter Straub.Ben t was born in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania to James Walker Ben t, a colonel in the United States Army, and his wife. His grandfather and namesake was a Minorcan descendant born in St. Augustine, Florida who led the U.S. Army Ordnance Corps from 1874 to 1891 with the rank of brigadier general, a graduate of the United States Military Academy who served in the American Civil War. The younger Ben t's paternal uncle Laurence Vincent Ben t was an ensign in the United States Navy during the Spanish-American War who later manufactured the French-Hotchkiss machine gun.