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Hoosier Poet
Barton Rees Pogue (1891-1965)

From Barton Rees Pogue's brochure (late 1940's)

WHO I AM.....BORN in Monon, Indiana on Friday the 13th, 1891.

REARED.....Father paddled me and mother strapped me in Monon, Frankfort, Perkinsville, New Palestine and Greenfield...all Indiana towns. I am a Hoosier, as Alton Packard once said, "born, bred and buttered."

EDUCATED.....I wandered aimlessly through the grades, "flunked"solid subjects in high school for two years, finally got my mental eyes open and graduated from Taylor Univ., Boston Univ. and the University of Michigan. For good measure I included the Powers and Rice Schools of the Spoken Word in Boston and Oak Bluffs, Mass.

WORKED.....I have never been daffy about work, but at an early age discovered the economic value of money. I have been Pogue the polisher of shoes, paper boy, parcel wrapper and cashier in a dept. store, photographer, preacher, professor, poet of the printed page and radio, politician, platform superintendent of Chautauqua, platform entertainer and publisher. I preached ten years in Methodist and Congregational churches. As a professor I was twelve years in the speech dept. of Taylor and Indiana Universities. I rhymed through sixteen years for the Indiana Farmers Guide, three years for the McClure Newspaper Syndicate, and am now doing a column for The Scripps-Howard Indpls. Times. I was twelve years in radio at station WLW in Cincinnati. As a publisher I have printed five books of my own verse. On the platform I have entertained every sort of group from Ojibway Indians to Natl.W.C.T.U. delegates.

WHAT I DO.....I am a humorist...not a comedian. I entertain in a chatty, cheerful, chummy way. I help people laugh. I encourage them to enjoy bits of homely sentiment. I believe that about 99.44% of the people, in spite of their fame and fortune and position, are down-to-earth creatures, so there's where the programs live...very much on the human side of life.

[The four programs he offered] THERE IS ALWAYS A TOMORROW....A PAIR OF SPECTACLES....THE GREATNESS OF BEING HUMAN...GO TO THE ANT

[In 1952 he was compelled because of an illness to stop his lecturing. Later, he resumed it at a slower pace, but a second attack in 1959 forced him to slow his tremendous pace.]

Barton Rees Pogue's Obituary
 Indianapolis Star, March, 1965

Marion, Ind. - Barton Rees Pogue, 74 years old, an Indiana poet who claimed he grew up on the works of James Whitcomb Riley, died yesterday after undergoing a checkup at Mayo clinic. A former minister and professor at Upland and Indiana universities, Mr. Pogue was to have published his sixth book of poetry tomorrow and was to have been honored Wednesday in ceremonies at Upland. Two days after the publication of "The Rhyme Book of a Real Boy" he was to have been honored with a dinner and program at a Barton Rees Pogue Day sponsored by the Upland Lions Club. At the time of his death he was librarian of the Upland Library.
A native of Monon, he lived his boyhood in Greenfield, the home of Riley. The family later move to Indianapolis where he attended Emmerich Manual Training High School. He graduated from Taylor Academy and Taylor University, Boston University School of Theology and the University of Michigan.
He had read his poetry more than 3,000 times in 20 states and for 12 years had a radio show on a Cincinnati station. He was the author of "Songs of the Soil", "Fortunes in Friendship," "The Omnibus,""The Lifter of Laughter," and "Wayside Windows."
Funeral services will be held at 10:30a.m. Tuesday in the Jones Funeral Home at Upland. Graveside services will be held at 2:30p.m. in the Park Cemetery at Greenfield. Survivors include the widow, Mrs. Maude Pogue, a daughter, Mrs. Carolyn Carll of Upland, and one grandchild. [Another obituary said he was a poet, humorist, professor, lecturer and former columnist for the Indianapolis Times.]

Hoosier Poets