The Interesting Mystery Behind the Death of Edgar Allan Poe (and his first writings)

Edgar Allan Poe died a mysterious, sudden death en route to work on a writing project. Most of the public assumed self-inflicted causation, and media death reports suggested as much with descriptors like 'congestion of the brain' and 'cerebral inflammation'.

Rumors around his demise included such ailments as drugs, syphilis and heart disease . . . and one about nefarious politics: some believed Poe fell after having been cooped up in a voter fraud scam known as "cooping"-- a practice wherein targets were drugged and shut into holding, in "room or coops", then dragged around to polling places to cast [often multiple] votes.

This curious account of Edgar Allan Poe is one of the great literary mysteries, brought to our attention in reading today via Bustle article penned by Charlotte Ahlin. Learn about this and four other literary mysteries "that have never been solved".

Other little-known facts about Edgar Allan Poe

On this day, 1815 June 22, Edgar Poe moved with the Allan family from Boston to London, where the young and recently orphaned boy would attend school for approximately five years before returning to America. Then, in four more years, Edgar's first-known poem was penned:

"Last night, with many cares & toils oppres'd,/ Weary, I laid me on a couch to rest." -Via Edgar Allan Poe Society of Baltimore

Fourteen years later, Edgar landed a job as a gentleman's magazine editor and soon followed that opportunity with publication of his first novel, The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket.


Further Reading:

Did you know that Poe is considered the father of detective stories? Learn more about Edgar Allan Poe's life and work: Edgar Allan Poe WebQuest

Edgar Allan Poe Remembered, via The Twilight Zone Vortex

 
REF:

• Meyers, Jeffrey (1992). Edgar Allan Poe: His Life and Legacy. 

• Shmoop Editorial Team. (2008, November 11). Edgar Allan Poe Timeline of Important Dates. Retrieved June 22, 2018.

• Wikipedia contributors. "Edgar Allan Poe." Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia, 5 Jun. 2018. Web. 22 Jun. 2018

How To Fix Toshiba Flash Cards Preventing Shutdown / Restart in Windows 10

Windows 10 users may notice upon Restart that a "flash cards" program is preventing restarts and shutdowns. The easiest option is to select "restart anyway", and most of us will do this. However, the best option may be to disable the program.

The typical method of disabling (worked for previous versions) would direct a user to locate [Toshiba] "Flash Cards" in the Microsoft Startup Menu and disable . . . but WIN 10 users may not find it listed.

Instead, they should look for the term "function key" [Toshiba Function Key Main] in place of 'flash cards' . . . and they should look for it in Task Manager.

The Internets produced a visual, to guide us, with complete directions:




There may be some concern as to function key usability after performing this disable instruction. On our system, this didn't turn out to be a problem; the function key renders expected results when used with its target keys.

It should be noted that we have not tested every function command, and that users may have various results. So far, it seems that regular [automatic] updates had already installed a patch to maintain function key usability despite disabling the program [as named] in the task menu.

Other users may not have performed the required update, and can find it at Toshiba's support page; according to users at Tom's Guide, downloading the Toshiba Function Key Main version (1.1.15.4) update works to rectify the original issue, without having to disable anything.

Our experience is that the Task Manager > Toshiba Function Key Main > disable solution, demonstrated in this video we're sharing today, works . . . and we'd advise this method before downloading new files; however, this choice may be broken down into something as simple as personal preference. Understandably, users can be nervous about disabling programs with critical-sounding names [function key!] and might rather look into downloading the file from Toshiba's site.

One could search "Toshiba Function Key Main version 1.1.15.4" in Windows Search and see if it's listed. There should be a version listed with a number either greater or lesser than 1.1.15.4. If it's lesser, then chances are that you need the update. In our case, the number is greater (and the steps in the video were the right solution for us).