Frances Ellen Watkins Harper

WRITER

Birthplace: Baltimore Maryland

September 24,1825- February 22,1911

Frances was born to free black parents who died when she was three years old. At

age 13, she did domestic work for a family who let her use their library. Soon she

began to write her own poetry and in 1854 her collection of verse and prose, Forest

Leaves, was published.

When she moved to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania to teach in the early 1850s, she joined the fight against

slavery with her writings. As she became more involved in the anti-slavery movement, she became an

effective speaker whose sense of humor could draw large audiences. In 1854, she toured Canada and her

writings appeared frequently in the Provincial Freeman, an antislavery newspaper. In 1859, she became

the first Black American to publish a short story, The Two Officers. Her novel, Iola Leroy or Shadows

Uplifted, which was published in 1892, made her the second Black woman to have a novel published in

the United States.

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