M. E. W. (Mary Elizabeth Wilson) Sherwood

Born in Keene, New Hampshire, in 1826, Mary Elizabeth Wilson Sherwood became known to readers under forms of her name such as M. E. W. Sherwood and Mrs. John Sherwood. She wrote widely across genres, publishing short stories, poems, novels, magazine pieces, and translations from European languages.

Sherwood was especially well known in her day for books about etiquette and society, including Manners and Social Usages, which helped make her a familiar voice on the rules and rituals of American social life. That mix of literary work and practical advice gave her an unusual place in late 19th-century culture: part author, part observer of how people lived and presented themselves.

She died in New York City in 1903. Today, she is remembered as a versatile writer whose books preserve both the tone of her era and the concerns of the readers she wrote for.