Julia Boynton Green (1861-1957)

Poet, Writer, Artist, Public Speaker
Born May 25, 1861, South Byron, New York
Died July 10, 1957, Los Angeles, California

Julia P. Boynton was born on May 25, 1861, in South Byron, New York, to James T. Boynton, a farmer, and Emily L. Boyton. She was descended from Maj. Gen. Nathaniel Greene of Revolutionary War fame. Her education was off and on. She studied at Ingham University, Le Roy Academy, and Wellesley College, as well as at the Art Students League in New York City and in London. I'm not sure that she ever received a college diploma. Nevertheless, she lived a life of accomplishment in an accomplished family.

Julia married Levi Worthington Green (1858-1932) in June 1890. The couple lived in Rochester, New York, then in Redlands, California, where L. Worthington Green was an orange grower. He was also an author. His works include two juvenile novels, Boy Fugitives in Mexico (1914) and Two American Boys in the War Zone (1915), as well as a number of poems and articles published in newspapers and magazines. Green was also a special agent for the Pala Indian Reservation in California. The Greens had three children, Gladys Green, Boynton M. Green, and Norman G. Green. Gladys was a librarian at Los Angeles Junior College and the University of California at Los Angeles, while Boynton was a professor of mechanical engineering at Stanford University and Norman was a structural engineer in San Francisco.

Julia Boynton Green wrote three volumes of verse, Lines and Interlines (1887), This Enchanted Coast: Verse on California Themes (1928 or 1929), and Noonmark (1936). According to a description of her papers at Huntington Library, she also had three unpublished books.

Holidays, seasons, and special times of year appear to have been of special interest to Julia. She was also a lover of her adopted home state of California. She read her poems and spoke in front of clubs and groups and was a member of the Southern Branch of the League of American Pen Woman.

From 1893 to 1925, Julia had poems in Argosy All-Story Weekly, The Atlantic Monthly, the Boston Transcript, The Century Magazine, The Christian Science Monitor, The Cosmopolitan, the New York Times, The Pacific Monthly, The Smart Set, Sunset, and other titles. Then she began something new.

Julia turned seventy in 1931. In that same year she began writing verse for fantasy and science fiction magazines. It's one thing for a poet born out the outset of the Civil War to write for Weird Tales. It was after all an old-fashioned magazine. But Julia Boynton Green also wrote for Amazing Stories! I would like to read her poems and to put them together in a little book.

Here are Julia Boynton Green's magazine credits from the Internet Speculative Fiction Database:

• "The Evolution of an Ace" in Amazing Stories (Mar. 1931)
• "The Night Express" in Amazing Stories (July 1931)
• "Evolution" in Amazing Stories (Aug. 1931)
• "This Mechanical Age" in Amazing Stories Quarterly (Fall 1931)
• "Radio Revelations" in Amazing Stories Quarterly (Fall/Winter 1932)
• "The Return" in Weird Tales (Sept. 1934)
• "Painted Cave" in Weird Tales (Apr. 1936)
• "Science and the Saucepans" in Amazing Stories (June 1936)

Two of these were reprinted in Sisters of Tomorrow: The First Women of Science Fiction, edited by Patrick B. Sharp and Lisa Yaszek and published in 2016. It might be well worth it to look for other science fiction and fantasy-related poems in her earlier work.

Julia Boynton Green died on July 10, 1957, in Los Angeles, California. She was ninety-six years old.

Julia Boynton Green's Poems in Weird Tales
"The Return" (Aug. 1934)
"Painted Cave" (Apr. 1936)

Further Reading
Julia Boynton Green's papers are at the Huntington Library in California. You can read a description by clicking here.

Julia Boynton Green (1861-1957), from the Los Angeles Herald, May 28, 1905, page 26.

Original text copyright 2022, 2023 Terence E. Hanley