Carroll Watson Rankin was the pen name of
American writer
The Lists of American writers include:
United States By ethnicity
*List of African-American writers
* List of Asian-American writers
* List of Cuban-American writers
* List of Egyptian-American writers
* List of Italian-American women writers
...
Caroline Clement Watson Rankin (1864–1945).
Biography
Rankin was born May 11, 1864, in
Marquette, Michigan
Marquette ( ) is the county seat of Marquette County, Michigan, Marquette County and the largest city in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, United States. Located on the shores of Lake Superior, Marquette is a major port known primarily for shippin ...
, in the Upper Peninsula, and raised her four children there. Her first writing assignment came at the age of 16, when she was hired as a reporter for the ''
Daily Mining Journal''. She kept the job until her marriage to Ernest Rankin in 1886.
Her free lance stories were published by ''Century'', ''Harper's Monthly'', ''Youth's Companion'', ''St. Nicholas'', ''Leslie's'', ''Lippincott's'', ''Metropolitan'' and other widely circulated periodicals. Her best known novel is ''Dandelion Cottage'', published in 1904 by Henry Holt and Company. She first wrote the story serially for her own children. Considered a regional classic in the Midwest, it tells of four young girls who negotiate the use of a derelict cottage belonging to a church as a playhouse by pulling dandelions for the senior warden of the church, prosperous Mr. Black. The real life model for Mr. Black is generally acknowledged to be Marquette businessman and philanthropist,
Peter White.
The original Dandelion Cottage is located at 440 East Arch and is privately owned.
Now that the book is in
public domain
The public domain (PD) consists of all the creative work to which no Exclusive exclusive intellectual property rights apply. Those rights may have expired, been forfeited, expressly Waiver, waived, or may be inapplicable. Because no one holds ...
, it is available from
Project Gutenberg
Project Gutenberg (PG) is a volunteer effort to digitize and archive cultural works, as well as to "encourage the creation and distribution of eBooks."
It was founded in 1971 by American writer Michael S. Hart and is the oldest digital li ...
and a print edition is available from the Marquette Regional History Center, published by the Marquette County Historical Society.
Rankin allowed her characters much latitude in emotion and behavior at a time when writing for children was often tepid and tutelary. Other of her novels for youth include:
*''The Girls of Gardenville'' (1906)
*''The Anti Foster Pet Association'' (1907)
*''The Adopting of Rosa Marie'' (1908)
*''Castaways of Pete's Patch'' (1911)
*''The Cinder Pond'' (1915)
*''Girls of Highland Hall'' (1921)
*''Gipsy Nan'' (1926)
*''Finders Keepers'' (1930)
*''Wolf Rock'' (1933)
*''Stump Village'' (1935)
References
External links
*
*
*
The Marquette County History Museum
{{DEFAULTSORT:Rankin, Carroll Watson
20th-century American novelists
American women short story writers
People from Marquette, Michigan
1864 births
1945 deaths
American women novelists
20th-century American women writers
20th-century American short story writers