Landon was born in
Eaton, New York, in 1839, the son of John and Nancy Marsh Landon. He attended
Madison University (now Colgate University) for one year, and graduated from
Union College in 1861. After graduation, he obtained a position in the
United States Treasury, and served in the Civil War under General
Augustus Louis Chetlain. He left the army in 1864, and became a cotton planter in Louisiana and Arkansas. In 1867 he traveled abroad in Russia as secretary to
Cassius M. Clay, Minister to Russia. He returned to the United States in 1870, and the following year published his first book,
The Franco-Prussian War in a Nutshell. He wrote and compiled several books of humor, and was past president of the New York News Association. He died at his home in
Yonkers, New York, on December 16, 1910, at the age of 71, after suffering from
locomotor ataxia for some six years. ==References==