Paul Revere's Ride

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow has been called, "the most popular poet in American history." When Longfellow wrote, few Americans remained who had a living memory of the American Revolution. With his poem, "Paul Revere's Ride" he succeeded in preserving part of that heroic memory in verse for many generations to come, the way Homer did for ancient Greeks, or Shakespeare for Englishmen in more recent times.