Dixie Willson
Dixie Willson , b. Dixie Lucile Reiniger Willson (born July 30, 1890 in Estherville , Iowa , † February 6, 1974 in Fair Haven , New Jersey ), was an American author. She wrote children's books and short stories for various magazines. Three of her works have been filmed.
Life
Dixie Willson was the first child of the lawyer John Willson (1866-1931) and the elementary school and piano teacher Rosalie Reiniger (1860-1931). The couple had married in 1889 and initially lived in the small town of Estherville in northern Iowa, where their daughter was born. In 1894 it moved to Mason City , about 135 kilometers further east , the county seat of Cerro Gordo County . Here Dixie Willson grew up with her siblings. In 1900 her brother John Cedric "Ced" was born († 1975, civil engineer), two years later Robert "Meredith" Reiniger, who later became known as a composer and musician under the name Meredith Willson . First, however, it was Dixie Willson who achieved national fame.
Like all family members, Willson was musical, she played the harp and in later years received a job offer from the Minneapolis Symphony Orchestra , which she turned down. She devoted herself mainly to writing. Her first story Willson wrote as a teenager to present to her grandmother for her birthday. The story was published by the Chicago Herald Tribune in 1905 under the title Fluff of Gold . Two years later, Willson won $ 25 writing a seven-line, humorous lingerie advertising slogan, beating 2,500 other contestants. These early successes motivated her to continue writing.
After Willson graduated from Mason City High School, she attended Iowa State Teachers College through 1910. She then worked as a teacher with children of preschool and elementary school age. She has taught in Independence , Iowa and Missoula , Montana , among others . However, in their youth they never stayed in one place for long.
In 1915 she married Benjamin Lampert and lived in Wisconsin , but divorced a year later. She then joined a musical comedy dance group in Chicago , with which she later moved to New York , where she performed briefly as a revue dancer with the Ziegfeld Follies . In New York she worked harder on her writing career. Her first professional publication was the short story Imogene Novre published by Munsey's Magazine in 1918 .
In 1920 Willson joined the Ringling Brothers Circus for 1.5 years . The then ringmaster Charles Ringling hired her as an elephant rider. This experience inspired Willson to write several children's books: The Empty Elephant (1923), Clown Town (1924), A Circus ABC (1924) and the story Help Yourself to Hay , published in 1927 in the Cosmopolitan . In 1923, Willson also published her best-known work, the narrative poem Honey Bear . Popular American women's magazines such as Ladies' Home Journal, The Delineator and Cosmopolitan as well as children's magazines such as St. Nicholas Magazine became aware of Willson and published her short stories. She was able to place herself in the Best Short Stories several times.
Willson, who had earned her living as a script reader at Fox Films after her arrival in New York, among other things , now also began to provide the templates for cinema films herself. In 1923 she wrote the screenplay for the film drama The Age of Desire . Three of her own stories have been filmed, the first being God Gave Me 20-Cents by the Famous Players-Lasky Cooperation. The silent film of the same name premiered in 1926 at the opening of the new Paramount Theater in New York. In 1927, First National released their story Here Y'Are, Brother under the title An Affair of the Follies and the following year Help Yourself to Hay as a Three-Ring Marriage .
After Willson came to New York in 1918 almost penniless, she had an income of around $ 50,000 in 1927.
In 1931, Dixie Willson gave birth to a daughter named Dana Willson (Briggs) in California . Her parents, who were divorced in the meantime, died in the same year. Dana was born to John's second wife, Minnie Willson. Hartzfeldt - raised until she died in 1940. After that, Willson took her daughter with him. Dana later described her mother as someone who was very absorbed in his work and often wrote from early morning without a break until noon.
However, Willson was unable to build on her most successful period as a writer in the 1920s in later years. She published recipes for Betty Crocker products, wrote poetry for greeting cards, and contributed to her brother Meredith's radio broadcasts. In addition to children's literature, she published two career guides.
In 1945 Willson married theater manager and producer Charles EH Hayden. They adopted a daughter and separated in the 1960s. Willson moved to Fair Haven, New Jersey, where she spent the last 15 years of her life and passed away in 1974. Her ashes are in the Willson family grave in Mason City.
literature
- Bill Oates: Meredith Willson - America's Music Man. AuthorHouse, Bloomington, Ind. 2005, ISBN 978-1-42083-524-3 .
plant
Dixie Willson has published numerous children's books, short stories, and poems in magazines.
Her best-known children's book is called Honey Bear and contains illustrations by Maginel Wright Barney , sister of Frank Lloyd Wright . The story told in verse ( narrative poetry ) is about a baby who is taken by a bear out of his bassinet into the forest, where he is given honey to eat. When the relieved mother finds it safe and sound, smeared over and over with honey, she comes up with the idea of calling it Honey in the future - a nickname that is later picked up by other parents. Tom Wolfe counts Honey Bear as one of the first works that shaped him as a writer. He incorporated lines from it into The Right Stuff and other of his books.
Books
- Pinky pup. PF Volland Co., Chicago 1922.
- Pinky Pup and The Empty Elephant. PF Volland Co., New York 1922.
- Honey bear. Algonquin Publishing Co., New York 1923.
- The Empty Elephant. PF Volland Co., New York 1923.
- Clown Town. Doubleday, Page & Co, Garden City, New York 1924.
- A Circus ABC. Frederick A. Stokes Co., New York 1924.
- Little Texas: A Story of the Circus. D. Appleton & Co., New York 1925.
- Tuffy Good Luck. PF Volland Co., New York 1927.
- Games For Grown Ups. Co-author Harriet Eager Davis, Delineator Service, New York 1929.
- Five minute plays. , Delineator Service, New York 1930.
- Once Upon A Monday. PF Volland Co., Joliet 1931.
- Where The World Folds Up at Night. D. Appleton & Co., New York 1932.
- Favorite Stories of Famous Children. Henry Holt & Co., New York 1938.
- Hostess of the Skyways. Dodd, Mead & Co, New York 1941.
- Hollywood starlet. Dodd, Mead & Co., New York 1942.
- Mystery of the Scarlet Staircase. Dodd, Mead & Co., New York 1946.
- The Veiled Mystery. Dodd, Mead & Co., New York 1948.
- Three buckaroos. John Martin's House, 1950.
- Way Out West: A Cowboy Story. PF Volland Co., 1950.
- Mystery in Spangles. Dodd, Mead & Co., New York 1950.
Scripts and film adaptations
- 1923 The Age of Desire.
- 1926 God Gave Me 20-Cents co-authors Elizabeth Meehan and Jack Russell
- 1927 An Affair of the Follies. (Here Y'Are, Brother) co-authors June Mathis and Carey Wilson, Al Rockett Productions
- 1928 Three-Ring Marriage (Help Yourself to Hay)
- 1932 Ebb Tide (God Gave Me 20-Cents)
Short stories published in magazines (selection)
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Source: The Standard Index of Short Stories, 1900-1933, Compiled by Francis J. Hannigan
Web links
- Dixie Willson in the Internet Movie Database (English)
- Dixie Willson literature in the WorldCat bibliographic database
- Dixie Willsons children's book Pinky Pup and The empty elephant Ebook and Text Archive from archive.org (read online or download)
- Tom Wolfe on Dixie's book Honey Bear Yale feature, The Books that Made the Writers
Individual evidence
- ^ Oates, p. 5
- ^ Oates, p. 6
- ↑ Oates, p. 23
- ↑ Oates, p. 15
- ↑ a b c d Page no longer available , search in web archives: Biography of Dixie Willsons and excerpt from an article in the Globe Gazette, Mason City, Iowa, July 6, 2001
- ↑ a b Oates, p. 24
- ↑ Oates, p. 25
- ↑ a b Oates, p. 26
- ↑ Oates, p. 53
- ↑ Yale feature, The Books that Made the Writers ( Memento of the original from November 14, 2012 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ^ The Standard Index of Short Stories, 1900-1933, Compiled by Francis J. Hannigan
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Willson, Dixie |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Willson, Dixie Lucile Cleaner (full name) |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | American author |
| DATE OF BIRTH | July 30, 1890 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Estherville , Iowa |
| DATE OF DEATH | February 6, 1974 |
| Place of death | Fair Haven , New Jersey |