Author: Harby, Isaac
Biography:
HARBY, Isaac (1788-1828: ANBO)
Journalist and playwright, he spent almost all of his life in his birthplace, Charleston SC. His parents were Solomon and Rebecca (Moses) Harby. Educated at a private academy, he studied law for a short time but gave it up and tried other things, all with reasonable success. He edited and contributed to several magazines and newspapers, beginning with the Quiver in 1807. He founded a school, Harby's Academy, in 1810. Two plays were well received in the Charleston Theatre in 1810 and 1819 (he is said to have written another, now lost, in his teens), and his dramatic criticism was highly thought of. In 1810 he married Rachael Mordecai; they had nine children, three of whom died in infancy. He was politically active not only through his newspapers but also in his church: in 1825 he was one of the founders of the Reformed Society of Israelites who seceded from the Sephardic Beth Elohim congregation in Charleston in order to adopt a simpler ritual with prayers in English as well as in Hebrew. After the death of his wife he moved to New York in 1828 hoping to live by his pen, but died there of typhoid fever only a few months later. (ANBO 21 Feb. 2019; DAB) HJ