Bret Harte, was born Francis Brett Hart in Albany, New York on August 25, 1836. He moved to California at age seventeen and settled into a career as a journalist. On April 29, 1860 he published his first story in the journal he was working for, The Golden Era in San Francisco. This piece, called "My Metamorphosis," was the first in a long career that made Harte famous across the world as the chronicler and story-teller of early California. He died of cancer in England in 1902. (By John Osborne)