Berton Braley

Berton Braley (29 January 1882 – 23 January 1966) was an American poet.

Braley was born in Madison, Wisconsin. His father, Arthur B. Braley, was a judge; he died when Berton Braley was seven years old. At 16, Braley quit high school and got a job working as a factory hand at a plow plant. After a few years, Braley went back to school and received his high school diploma. Shortly thereafter he discovered Tom Hood's poetry instructional book The Rhymester. He spent some time after 1905 living in Butte, Montana, working as a staff journalist on the Butte Evening News (published 1905-1911).

Braley was first published at the age of 11 when a small publication printed a fairy tale he wrote. He was a prolific writer, with verses in many magazines, including Coal Age, American Machinist, Nation's Business, Forbes magazine, Harper's Magazine, Atlantic Monthly, and the Saturday Evening Post. His work appeared in numerous pulp magazines, including Adventure, Breezy Stories, Complete Stories, The Popular Magazine, Short Stories and Snappy Stories. He published twenty books, about half of them being poetry collections.

In 1917, John Philip Sousa composed a marching song for the University of Wisconsin, titled Wisconsin Forward Forever with lyrics by Berton Braley. In 1934, Braley published the autobiographical Pegasus Pulls a Hack: Memoirs of a Modern Minstrel.

His poem "Do It Now" became widely reprinted after 1915. The poem begins:

If with pleasure you are viewing any work a man is doing, If you like him or you love him, tell him now.

The poem was also set as a hymn in Presbyterian hymnbooks and sung by glee clubs.

His other popular poems include "Start where you stand"

Braley was a prolific author of poems, prose, plays, and humorous non-fiction articles

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