H. Rea (Hannah Rea) Woodman

Born on February 10, 1870, in Jacksonville, Illinois, Hannah Rea Woodman soon moved with her family to Wichita, Kansas. According to the Kansas Historical Society, she was captured by Arapaho Indians at age three and later returned to her parents with help from William "Buffalo Bill" Mathewson, a striking episode that has become part of her biographical record.

Woodman pursued an unusually strong education for her time. She studied at Garfield University, completed her BA at Drake University, earned an MA at the University of Kansas, and also did graduate work at the University of Nebraska and the University of Minnesota. A member of Phi Beta Kappa, she taught English and literature at several schools and universities while continuing to write.

Her surviving work includes plays, essays, and other manuscripts from the early 1900s, with titles such as The Cinder Maid, The King of Nolande, and The Bobbie Bennett Plays for Children. In 1927 she returned to Wichita, where she spent the rest of her life writing and teaching private classes before her death there in 1951.