Laura Newbold Wood Roper (March 15, 1911 – December 5, 2003) was an American author who also published under the name L. N. Wood. In the 1930s she worked for the

Works Progress Administration The Works Progress Administration (WPA; renamed in 1939 as the Work Projects Administration) was an American New Deal agency that employed millions of jobseekers (mostly men who were not formally educated) to carry out public works projects, i ...

. She published three biographies for young adults in the 1940s. In 1973 she published a biography of

Frederick Law Olmsted Frederick Law Olmsted (April 26, 1822August 28, 1903) was an American landscape architect, journalist, social critic, and public administrator. He is considered to be the father of landscape architecture in the USA. Olmsted was famous for co- ...

. She wrote the first biography ever written about

Raymond L. Ditmars Raymond Lee Ditmars (June 22, 1876 – May 12, 1942) was an American herpetologist, writer, public speaker and pioneering natural history filmmaker. Biography Ditmars was fascinated by all animals, but primarily reptiles, obtaining his fi ...

Life & career

Wood was born in

St. Louis, Missouri St. Louis () is the second-largest city in Missouri, United States. It sits near the confluence of the Mississippi River, Mississippi and the Missouri Rivers. In 2020, the city proper had a population of 301,578, while the Greater St. Louis, ...

. She graduated.from

Vassar College Vassar College ( ) is a private liberal arts college in Poughkeepsie, New York, United States. Founded in 1861 by Matthew Vassar, it was the second degree-granting institution of higher education for women in the United States, closely follo ...

with an A.B. in 1932. In 1940 she married W. Crosby Roper, Jr. (died 1982). She published a biography of Frederick Law Olmsted in 1973. A review in the '' American Historical Review'' called her book on Olmsted superb and described it as covering new ground as far as his personal interests and role in the reform movement were delved into. The ''

New York Times Book Review ''The New York Times Book Review'' (''NYTBR'') is a weekly paper-magazine supplement to the Sunday edition of ''The New York Times'' in which current non-fiction and fiction books are reviewed. It is one of the most influential and widely rea ...

'' published a letter she wrote regarding Olmsted's views on slavery. A review in the ''Journal of the

Society of Architectural Historians The Society of Architectural Historians (SAH) is an international not-for-profit organization that promotes the study and preservation of the built environment worldwide. Based in Chicago in the United States, the Society's 3,500 members include ...

'' praised the book. The

Library of Congress The Library of Congress (LOC) is the research library that officially serves the United States Congress and is the ''de facto'' national library of the United States. It is the oldest federal cultural institution in the country. The library is ...

and

National Library of Australia The National Library of Australia (NLA), formerly the Commonwealth National Library and Commonwealth Parliament Library, is the largest reference library in Australia, responsible under the terms of the ''National Library Act 1960'' for "mainta ...

have a collection of her papers including research notes and correspondence related to her book on Frederick Law Olmsted. She died in

Cotuit Cotuit ( ) is one of the villages of the Town of Barnstable on Cape Cod in Barnstable County, Massachusetts, United States. Located on a peninsula on the south side of Barnstable about midway between Falmouth and Hyannis, Cotuit is bounded by t ...

, Massachusetts.

Bibliography

*''Walter Reed:Doctor in Uniform'' (1943), J. Messner, New York illustrated by Douglas Duer *''Raymond L. Ditmars: His Exciting Career with Reptiles, Animals, and Insects'' 1944 *''Louis Pasteur'' 1948 *''FLO: A Biography of Frederick Law Olmsted'' (1973) Johns Hopkins University Press

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Wood, Laura Newbold 1911 births 2003 deaths Vassar College alumni Writers from St. Louis 20th-century American women writers 21st-century American women