American Theron Newell was still a journalism student at Kansas State when his poem was submitted to the 1936 Arts Competition. After he finished university, he had to work as a merchant sailor for a few years. During World War II Newell married his wife Dorothy, who was also a journalist. From 1948-58 they published their own newspaper in Vancouver, Washington. In 1961 they moved to Novato, California, where they both worked for the Independent Journal. After his death in 1993, Newell’s ashes were scattered over Mt. St. Helens in Washington. The hero of the poem Philopoemen, last of the Greek was a general from the city of Megalopolis on the Peloponnese and became a strategist of the Achaean League in ancient Greece. After being captured in a battle, he had to empty a cup of poison. His ashes were later buried in Megalopolis.
United States