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Wednesday, March 27, 2002

Willa S. Cather achieved fame as an author, winning a Pulitzer Prize for her novel "One of Ours" in 1922.

She was raised in Nebraska and was a graduate of the University of Nebraska. Cather came to Pittsburgh at age 23 following a job offer from Pittsburgher Charles Axtell. Axtell ran a new ladies magazine, The Home Monthly, as a competitor to the Ladies' Home Journal. Many of the new magazine's articles were written by Cather under a variety of pseudonyms to fill the issues. While in Pittsburgh, she lived on Harvard Street and Murray Hill Avenue, both in the East End.

The Home Monthly eventually was sold, and her next Pittsburgh occupation was as a reporter and writer for The Leader, a city newspaper. She also sent columns to the Nebraska Courier. Her columns appeared in that newspaper from 1897 to 1900.

Subsequently, Cather's career changed. She became a teacher in the Pittsburgh public school system. She served on the faculty of old Central High and Allegheny High School, teaching Latin, English and composition from 1903 through 1906. In 1906, she left Pittsburgh to become an editor for McClure's magazine.

As she had since college, Cather wrote short stories and poetry, and her first published book in 1903 was a collection of verses called "April Twilights." After 1913, she devoted her time to writing, and many of her stories were colored by Pittsburgh images she observed in the Hill District, South Side and Mount Oliver. Her last novel, "Sapphira and the Slave Girl," was published in 1940. Cather died in 1947.

Sinclair Lewis declared that her novel "Lost Lady" ranked with the best of Nathaniel Hawthorne and Stephen Crane.

-- By Dr. E. Kenneth Vey, History Center Library and Archives volunteer

Thursday, March 28, 2002