author
Harry Vincent Wann
b. 1887
Best remembered for a practical early-20th-century guide to learning French, this Indiana educator wrote with the clear, helpful tone of someone used to teaching in real classrooms. His work turns grammar and conversation into something approachable rather than intimidating.
1 Audiobook
French Conversation and Composition
by Harry Vincent Wann
About the author
Harry Vincent Wann was an American educator and author born in 1887. The clearest details available point to him as a longtime teacher of French: his book French Conversation and Composition identifies him as an M.A. and a professor of Romance languages at Indiana State Normal School.
Published in 1920, French Conversation and Composition was designed as a working classroom text, combining spoken practice with review of basic grammar. That practical aim gives a good sense of Wann's style as a writer—direct, orderly, and focused on helping students actually use the language.
Available records also indicate that he was born in Warsaw, Indiana, on September 3, 1887, and died in 1970. Beyond those basics, reliable biographical information appears to be limited, so he is known today chiefly through the teaching book that preserved his voice and methods.