Literature

Katherine Anne Porter was born Callie Russell Porter on May 15, 1890, in Indian Creek, Texas. Porter was best known for her long short stories written in flawless prose, which have a texture and complexity usually found only in novels.

On May 3, 2003, the Old Man of the Mountain rock formation in New Hampshire collapsed.  It had been the official state emblem for decades, and continues to appear on license plates and other items.

On April 24, 1800, President John Adams officially established the Library of Congress.  It’s America’s oldest federal cultural institution, and one of the largest libraries in the world, with more than 171 million items.

Harlem Renaissance novelist Nellallitea “Nella” Walker Larsen was born on April 13, 1891, in Chicago, Illinois. Though her writing career was brief, Larsen produced some of the first groundbreaking works to focus on mixed race identity and the feeling of not belonging.

Robert Frost was born on March 26, 1874, in San Francisco, California.  He’s the only poet to have won four Pulitzer Prizes for Poetry and has been called one of America’s “public literary figures, almost an artistic institution.”

Ezra Jack Keats was born on March 11, 1916, in Brooklyn, New York.  Keats was a writer and illustrator of children’s books, most famously, The Snowy Day.

Ralph Waldo Ellison was born on March 1, 1913, in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. A self-proclaimed Renaissance Man, Ellison was a talented musician and writer, most famous for his novel, Invisible Man.

Frederic Eugene Ives was born on February 17, 1856, in Litchfield, Connecticut. He developed the first successful half-tone process and invented the “Kromskop,” which projected three identical images through different colored filters to produce some of the first color photographs.

William Allen White was born on February 10, 1868, in Emporia, Kansas.  A newspaper editor, politician and author, he was considered “the most loved and most distinguished member” of the Kansas press.