James Stephens was an Irish author and artist who lived from February 9, 1880, to December 26, 1950. Stephens' father died when he was two years old, and his mother remarried when he was six. For begging on the streets, Stephens was sent to the Meath Protestant Industrial School for Boys in Blackrock, where he spent most of the rest of his youth. Before he became a solicitor's clerk, he went to school with his adopted brothers Thomas and Richard (Tom and Dick) Collins. They participated in and won a number of sports events, even though James was very short. People loved him and called him "Tiny Tim." He became very interested in military bravery after hearing stories about his adoptive family. He would have become a fighter if he wasn't so tall. Stephens became more interested in socialism and the Irish language in the early 1900s. By 1912, he was a committed Irish Republican. He was good friends with the leader of 1916, Thomas MacDonagh. At the time, MacDonagh was editor of The Irish Review and deputy teacher at St. Enda's, PH Pearse's radical bilingual Montessori school. Later, he became manager of the Irish Theatre.