Ethel M. (Ethel May) Kelley

Born on June 21, 1878, in West Harwich, Massachusetts, Ethel May Kelley was an American writer of novels, short stories, and poems. She began writing young and went on to build a varied literary career that included editing as well as creative work.

Kelley published children’s books, poetry, and fiction, and became especially known for novels such as Outside Inn, Turn About Eleanor, and Beauty and Mary Blair. Her writing belongs to the lively magazine-and-book world of the early 1900s, where she moved comfortably between different forms and audiences.

She died on August 1, 1955, in West Harwich. Today, she is remembered as a versatile author whose work still offers a glimpse of popular American reading in the first decades of the twentieth century.