Willis, whose siblings included Nathaniel Parker Willis and Fanny Fern,Baker, Thomas N. Nathaniel Parker Willis and the Trials of Literary Fame. New York: Oxford University Press, 2001: 160. . was born on February 10, 1819, in Boston, Massachusetts. He attended Chauncey Hall, the Boston Latin School, and Yale College where he was a member of Skull and Bones in 1841.
