Bates, Katherine Lee

Bates, Katherine Lee

(1859–1929) poet, writer; born in Falmouth, Mass. Her father died soon after her birth, and her family moved to Wellesley (then Grantville), Mass., where she was schooled locally and graduated from Wellesley (B.A. 1880; M.A. 1891). She taught on the high school level for five years before teaching English at Wellesley (1885–1925). She wrote travel books, children's stories, textbooks, and poetry, as in America the Dream (1930). She is best known for her poem, "America the Beautiful" (1895), written after a visit to Pikes Peak and the World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago (1893). Set to the music of Samuel Ward, the poem continues to rival the national anthem in popularity.

The Cambridge Dictionary of American Biography, by John S. Bowman. Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1995. Reproduced with permission.