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Biography

Harriette Arnowhttp://webpages.marshall.edu/~broyles2/author.html

Ms. Arnow was born Harriette Louisa Simpson on July 7, 1908, in Wayne County Kentucky. Ms. Arnow’s parents are Elias Thomas Simpson and Mollie Jane Simpson. The Simpson family date back five generations prior to Harriette’s arrival in Wayne County. The Simpson family also included four sisters and one brother. All children attended the nearby Burnside School in Wayne County. Harriette attended that school for all of her early education with the exception of two terms of boarding school (1919 -1920) and one year of home-schooling (1918), (Broyles).

Ms. Arnow earned her Bachelor of Science during her course of study first at Berea College and then the University of Louisville. Throughout her college career she continued to write poetry and be a member of various literary societies at her campuses. Upon graduation from the University of Louisville, she began teaching in Pulaski County, Kentucky. In 1931, she became principal of a small school in Pulaski County. In 1934, Ms. Arnow left teaching in order to pursue her dream of writing when she moved to Cincinnati (Broyles).

Her first book published was Mountain Path in 1936. This was then followed by the highly successful Hunter’s Horn in 1949. That novel received great acclaim from critics across the country. After writing fiction successfully, Ms. Arnow moved onto writing non-fiction when she published Seedtime on the Cumberland and Flowering of the Cumberland. Both novels were historical studies of the development of the Cumberland Valley (Broyles).

Ms. Arnow met and married her husband, Harold Arnow, in March of 1939. Her daughter, Marcella, was born in 1941, followed by her son, Thomas, in 1946. Prior to giving birth to her son the Arnow family moved into a wartime housing project in Detroit, would later serve as the setting for her novel, The Dollmaker, which came out in 1954 (Broyles).

Ms. Arnow passed away in 1986, at the age of 78 (Broyles).

-Leslie Baldwin

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