- Henry Van Dyke
The New Testament doesn't say how many Magi actually visited the infant Jesus. Tradition says there were three, based on the three gifts mentioned in Matthew's Infancy Narrative.
But, in the 19th century, a story was published that added a fourth wise man.
Henry Van Dyke was a Presbyterian minister, an English professor at Princeton University, and a friend of Helen Keller. In 1896, he wrote a story about a fourth wise man who planned to travel with the Magi to Bethlehem, but was separated from them when he stopped to help a dying man.
The story has been made into a TV movie starring Martin Sheen, as well as a play and an opera.
- Little Blue Book, Diocese of Saginaw