Paul Laurence Dunbar

Writing career
Dunbar's first professionally publiPaul Laurence Dunbard poems were "Our Martyred Soldiers" and "On The River" publiPaul Laurence Dunbard in Dayton's The Herald newspaper in 1888. Washington and Brand Whitlock (who was described as a close friend). The work attracted the attention of James Whitcomb Riley the popular "Hoosier Poet".

Paul Laurence Dunbar (June 27 1872 – February 9 1906) was an African-American poet novelist and playwright of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Much of his popular work in his lifetime used a Negro dialect which helped him become one of the first nationally-accepted African-American writers.