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Tom Taylor (1817–1880) was an English dramatist, public servant and writer. After a brief academic career in English literature and language at University College London in the 1840s, Taylor practised law and became a civil servant. At the same time he became a journalist, most prominently as a contributor to and eventually the editor of the magazine Punch. He also began a theatre career and is now best known as a playwright. With up to one hundred plays staged during his career, both original work and adaptations of French plays, Taylor's output covers a range of genres from farce to melodrama. Most fell into neglect after Taylor's death, but Our American Cousin (1858), which achieved great success in the 19th century, remains famous as the piece that was being performed in the presence of Abraham Lincoln when he was assassinated in 1865. This undated photograph by the studio of Samuel Robert Lock and George C. Whitfield is part of Men of Mark: A Gallery of Contemporary Portraits, a collection published in 1881. Photograph credit: Lock & Whitfield; restored by Adam Cuerden
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