Kate McPhelim Cleary (August 22, 1863 – July 16, 1905) was a 19th-century Canadian-American
author
An author is the writer of a book, article, play, mostly written work. A broader definition of the word "author" states:
"''An author is "the person who originated or gave existence to anything" and whose authorship determines responsibility f ...
.
Biography
Kate McPhelim was born on August 22, 1863, in
Richibucto
Richibucto is a town in Kent County, New Brunswick, Canada.
Geography
The town is situated on the Richibucto River where it discharges into the Northumberland Strait.
History
Richibucto had been the location of an annual Mi'kmaq summer coas ...
,
New Brunswick
New Brunswick (french: Nouveau-Brunswick, , locally ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada. It is one of the three Maritime provinces and one of the four Atlantic provinces. It is the only province with both English and ...
, the daughter of James McPhelim and Margaret Kelly, two Irish immigrants who had met after moving to Canada. Her father died when she was two years old, leaving her mother to raise her four children alone. After a brief return to Ireland to live with relatives, financial hardships forced the family to emigrate to
Philadelphia
Philadelphia, often called Philly, is the List of municipalities in Pennsylvania#Municipalities, largest city in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the List of United States cities by population, sixth-largest city i ...
. McPhelim published her first poem at the age of 14 before briefly turning to painting and sketching for money. In 1878, at age 15, she published her first short story, "Only Jerry" in the magazine ''Saturday Night'' and began writing prose and poetry in earnest, often under the pseudonym "K. Temple More". During this time, all four of the McPhelim children turned to writing stories, poems and articles for such publications as ''
The Chicago Tribune
The ''Chicago Tribune'' is a daily newspaper based in Chicago, Illinois, United States, owned by Tribune Publishing. Founded in 1847, and formerly self-styled as the "World's Greatest Newspaper" (a slogan for which WGN radio and television ar ...
'' and Philadelphia's ''Saturday Night'' as a source of income for the family.
Two years later in 1880, McPhelim's family moved to
Chicago
(''City in a Garden''); I Will
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, map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago
, coordinates =
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, subdivision_type = Country
, subdivision_name ...
, where she married local businessman Michael Timothy Cleary in 1884. Mrs. Clearly later reflected on her period in Chicago in her semiautobiographical short story "Why We Didn't Hear Nilsson" (1899): "We were poor. We were disgustingly poor. We were absurdly poor. Not that our poverty distressed us. We generally got what we wanted — on credit. To our credit be it said we always paid — when we had the money." Not long after her marriage, they relocated with her mother to
Hubbell, Nebraska, where Michael Cleary had established a lumber business in partnership with his brother-in-law, John Templeton. Between the years of 1887 and 1894, she gave birth to five children (James, Marguerite, Gerald, Rosemarie and Vera Valentine). Her mother died of
pneumonia
Pneumonia is an inflammatory condition of the lung primarily affecting the small air sacs known as alveoli. Symptoms typically include some combination of productive or dry cough, chest pain, fever, and difficulty breathing. The severi ...
in 1893, and in 1894 her own life was threatened by a fever following the birth of her youngest daughter, Vera. In that same year, her daughter Marguerite died of
typhoid
Typhoid fever, also known as typhoid, is a disease caused by ''Salmonella'' serotype Typhi bacteria. Symptoms vary from mild to severe, and usually begin six to 30 days after exposure. Often there is a gradual onset of a high fever over several d ...
fever at the age of six. During this period, she had befriended fellow writer
Elia W. Peattie, and the two bonded over their shared financial, health, and family concerns. In 1893, Peattie wrote a tribute to Cleary titled "A Bohemian in Nebraska".
In 1895, Michael Cleary left temporarily for Chicago in an attempt to rescue his business, and during the next three years he traveled frequently in search of a better climate to alleviate his failing health. In 1895, her daughter Rosemarie died at the age of three. Two years later, Kate gave birth to another son (Edward) in 1897. In 1898 her husband sold the
lumber
Lumber is wood that has been processed into dimensional lumber, including beams and planks or boards, a stage in the process of wood production. Lumber is mainly used for construction framing, as well as finishing (floors, wall panels, wi ...
business and moved the family to Chicago.
In 1902, Cleary voluntarily entered a private
sanitarium for an addiction to
morphine
Morphine is a strong opiate that is found naturally in opium, a dark brown resin in poppies (''Papaver somniferum''). It is mainly used as a pain medication, and is also commonly used recreationally, or to make other illicit opioids. T ...
. The following year she was admitted to the
Illinois Northern Hospital for the Insane in
Elgin, Illinois
Elgin ( ) is a city in Cook and Kane counties in the northern part of the U.S. state of Illinois. Elgin is located northwest of Chicago, along the Fox River. As of the 2020 Census, the city had a population of 114,797, the seventh-large ...
in order to recover from her morphine dependency. The hospital pronounced her sane in the spring of 1904. In 1905, her husband attempted to commit Cleary involuntarily to an
insane asylum
The lunatic asylum (or insane asylum) was an early precursor of the modern psychiatric hospital.
The fall of the lunatic asylum and its eventual replacement by modern psychiatric hospitals explains the rise of organized, institutional psychiatry ...
, but his attempt was thwarted by a court battle in which a jury determined that she was sane. She died soon thereafter at the age of 41, succumbing to a heart condition she had endured most of her life.
Critical response and legacy
By the end of her life, Kate McPhelim Cleary published hundreds of stories, essays, and poems, as well as one novel, ''The Gallant Lady'' in 1897. In 1898, she was named by ''The Chicago Chronicle'' as "One of the three leading women humorists in Chicago". Her short stories regularly appeared in such publications as ''
The Chicago Tribune
The ''Chicago Tribune'' is a daily newspaper based in Chicago, Illinois, United States, owned by Tribune Publishing. Founded in 1847, and formerly self-styled as the "World's Greatest Newspaper" (a slogan for which WGN radio and television ar ...
'', ''Puck'', ''Belford's Monthly'', ''
The Chicago Daily News
The ''Chicago Daily News'' was an afternoon daily newspaper in the midwestern United States, published between 1875 and 1978 in Chicago, Illinois.
History
The ''Daily News'' was founded by Melville E. Stone, Percy Meggy, and William Dougherty ...
'', ''
McClure's
''McClure's'' or ''McClure's Magazine'' (1893–1929) was an American illustrated monthly periodical popular at the turn of the 20th century. The magazine is credited with having started the tradition of muckraking journalism ( investigative, wa ...
'', ''
Good Housekeeping
''Good Housekeeping'' is an American women's magazine featuring articles about women's interests, product testing by The Good Housekeeping Institute, recipes, diet, and health, as well as literary articles. It is well known for the "Good Hous ...
'', ''
Cosmopolitan
Cosmopolitan may refer to:
Food and drink
* Cosmopolitan (cocktail), also known as a "Cosmo"
History
* Rootless cosmopolitan, a Soviet derogatory epithet during Joseph Stalin's anti-Semitic campaign of 1949–1953
Hotels and resorts
* Cosmopoli ...
'', ''St. Nicholas'', and ''The Youth's Companion''. Her poem "Nebraska" was recited at the
World's Columbian Exposition
The World's Columbian Exposition (also known as the Chicago World's Fair) was a world's fair held in Chicago in 1893 to celebrate the 400th anniversary of Christopher Columbus's arrival in the New World in 1492. The centerpiece of the Fair, hel ...
in Chicago in 1893. Her feminist novel ''Like a Gallant Lady'' was received favorably by the critical press, which compared her novel to the works of
Hamlin Garland
Hannibal Hamlin Garland (September 14, 1860 – March 4, 1940) was an American novelist, poet, essayist, short story writer, Georgist, and psychical researcher. He is best known for his fiction involving hard-working Midwestern farmers.
Biogra ...
.
"Kate McPhelim Cleary: A Gallant Lady Reclaimed"
Lopers.net. Accessed October 6, 2008.
Selected works
* "The Lady of Lynhurst" (1886)
* "Vella Vernel" (1887)
* ''Feet of Clay'' (1893)
* "Nebraska" (1893)
* "Told on a Prairie Schooner' (1893)
* "The New Man" (1895)
* "A Prairie Sketch" (1895)
* "Dust Storm" (1895)
* ''Like a Gallant Lady'' (1897)
* "Jim Peterson’s Pension" (1899)
* "The Rebellion of Mrs. McLelland" (1899)
* "An Ornament to Society" (1899)
* "The Road That Didn’t Lead Anywhere" (1899)
* "His Onliest One" (1899)
* "How Jimmy Ran Away" (1899)
* "Sent to Syringa" (1899)
* "The Stepmother" (1901)
Adaptations
* In 2001, the Radio Tales
''Radio Tales'' is an American series of radio drama which premiered on National Public Radio on October 29, 1996. This series adapted classic works of American and world literature such as ''The War of the Worlds'', ''Twenty Thousand Leagues Un ...
series produced the radio drama '' Feet of Clay'', which was an adaptation of Kate McPhelim Cleary's short story of the same name, as published in ''Belford's Monthly'' magazine in 1893. The radio drama adaptation premiered on National Public Radio
National Public Radio (NPR, stylized in all lowercase) is an American privately and state funded nonprofit media organization headquartered in Washington, D.C., with its NPR West headquarters in Culver City, California. It differs from other ...
and is subsequently broadcast on XM Satellite Radio
XM Satellite Radio (XM) was one of the three satellite radio ( SDARS) and online radio services in the United States and Canada, operated by Sirius XM Holdings. It provided pay-for-service radio, analogous to subscription cable television. Its se ...
.
References
External links
*
Kate M. Cleary
at ''Encyclopedia of the Great Plains''
Kate McPhelim Cleary
at ''Nebraska Authors''
by Susanne K. George
by Stacy Oberembt
by Dr. Susanne K. Bloomfield, University of Nebraska
{{DEFAULTSORT:Cleary, Kate McPhelim
1863 births
1905 deaths
People from Kent County, New Brunswick
19th-century American novelists
American women short story writers
American feminist writers
American women novelists
19th-century American women writers
19th-century American short story writers
Wikipedia articles incorporating text from A Woman of the Century