John Cleves Symmes, Jr. (nonfiction)

"John Cleves Symmes, Jr and His Hollow Earth" by John J. Audubon, 1820.

John Cleves Symmes, Jr. (November 5, 1780 – May 28, 1829) was an American Army officer, trader, and lecturer.

Symmes is best known for his 1818 variant of the (now-discredited) Hollow Earth Theory, which introduced the concept of openings to the inner world at the poles.

Symmes' eldest son, Americus Symmes, was seventeen when his father died, leaving him as the sole support of the family, with an estate significantly in debt.

Americus provided for his mother and siblings and paid off his father's debts.

He also championed his father's legacy, erecting a memorial to him (a pylon topped with a globe carved in the shape of a hollow sphere) and publishing in 1878 an edited collection of his father's papers.

Nonfiction cross-reference

External links:

• John Cleves Symmes, Jr. @ Wikipedia