Mary E. (Mary Eliza) Ireland

Born in Cecil County, Maryland, on January 9, 1834, Mary Eliza Ireland grew up in the community then known as Brick Meeting House, later called Calvert. She was educated at a ladies' seminary in Jamaica, Long Island, and later lived in Kent County, Baltimore, and Washington, D.C. with her husband, John M. Ireland.

Ireland wrote short stories, serial fiction, poetry, and translations from German. An account in Woman of the Century says that some of her magazine stories won prizes, and it highlights her early sketch "The Defoe Family in America," published in Scribner's Magazine in 1876. Her books included Timothy: His Neighbors and Friends as well as translations such as Red Carl, Lenchen's Brother, The Block House on the Shore, Erna Stark, and Betty's Decision.

She is remembered as a versatile literary figure whose writing joined local American subjects with an interest in European fiction and social themes. Mary E. Ireland died in 1927, leaving behind work that reflects both the magazine culture and the translation interests of her era.