Willa Cather: 1873-1947

Willa Cather was born December 7, 1873 in Back Creek Valley, Virginia. At the age of nine she moved with her family to a farm in the Nebraska settler country. There she grew up among the immigrants from Europe, most of them coming from Scandinavia.

The new ranch was not a success, and in 1884 the family moved to a nearby small railroad town. Cather was educated at home, and later she attended Red Cloud High School.

In 1890 Cather moved to Lincoln, Nebraska, to escape the conservatism of the small town. She then spent 10 years in Pittsburgh, first as a newspaper-woman and then as a high-school teacher of English and Latin.

At the age of 32, Cather moved to New York to edit McClure's Magazine. She was 40 when her first book "O Pioneers!" appeared. She resigned in 1912 from McClure's and began writing full-time.

In 1922 Cather won the Pulitzer Prize for her novel "One of Ours." Altogether she wrote twelve novels and a lot of short fiction.

Cather died on April 24, 1947.