McNeil, [Henry] Everett

   (1862–1929)

   Author of sixteen boys’ books and friend of HPL. He first met HPL in New York in September 1922; he was a member of the Kalem Club during 1924–26. McNeil was one of the first to urge HPL to contribute to the newly founded WT(see HPL to James F.Morton, March 29, 1923; AHT). He was the author of Dickon Bend the Bow and Other Wonder Tales (1903), The Lost Treasure Cave; or, Adventures with the Cowboys of Colorado (1905), In Texas with Davy Crockett: A Story of the Texas War of Independence (1908; rpt. 1937), The Cave of Gold: A Tale of California in ’49 (1911), Tonty of the Iron Hand (1925), Daniel Du Luth; or, Adventuring on the Great Lakes (1926), The Shores of Adventure; or, Exploring in the New World with Jacques Cartier (1929), and others, many of them published by E.P.Dutton (HPL believed that Dutton’s stingy contracts contributed to McNeil’s poverty). He lived mostly in poor parts of New York City, notably Hell’s Kitchen; because of this, and because of a feud within the Kalem Club that caused separate “McNeil” and “Leeds” meetings, many members avoided coming to McNeil’s apartment, but HPL always came. He appreciated McNeil’s childlike naivete; George Kirk described him as “an oldster—lovely purely white hair, writes books for boys and does not need to write down to them, he is quite equal mentally” (the comment was not meant derogatorily). Late in life, suffering from poor health, he moved to Tacoma, Washington, to live with his sister but died shortly after arriving there. HPL wrote an unaffected tribute to him in a letter to James F.Morton ( SL3.92–94; see also 3.112–15). “The Pigeon-Flyers” of Fungi from Yuggothwas inspired by McNeil’s death.