October 7, 1849 -- Edgar Allan Poe died, after a violent bout of drinking left him delirious. Poe once wrote:

"My love, she sleeps! Oh, may her sleep
As it is lasting, so be deep!
Soft may the worms about her creep!"

"Quoth the Raven nevermore." -- Poe's epitaph.

It would have been elegant for Poe's last word to have been "Nevermore," in answer to the question he was asked on his deathbed ("Would you like to see your friends?"), but his dying utterance was probably the much more somber, "Lord help my poor soul."