Eleanor H. Porter

Eleanor H. Porter was born in Littleton, New Hampshire on 19 December 1868. The first part of her life was dominated by music. She established a career singing in private homes, at public functions and in church choirs. She married John Lyman Porter, a Vermont businessman, in 1892. By 1901, Porter had given up her musical career in favour of writing short stories for magazines. Her first novel was Cross Currents (1907). Porter mainly wrote children’s literature, adventure stories and romance fiction. Her most famous novel is Pollyanna (1913), later followed by a sequel, Pollyanna Grows Up (1915). Her 1916 novel, Just David, became another bestselling children’s book. Throughout her career, Eleanor wrote fifteen novels and about 200 short stories. She died in Cambridge, Massachusetts on 21 May 1920 and was buried at the Mount Auburn Cemetery.