Mary E. (Mary Ella) Waller

Born in Boston on March 1, 1855, Mary Ella Waller was an American writer and educator whose career stretched across fiction, children's literature, and literary translation. After the deaths of her father and only sibling in 1867, she left school young and later spent several years traveling in Europe with her mother, an experience that helped deepen her interest in languages and literature.

Waller went on to write more than twenty novels, along with stories for younger readers, and she also translated German verse into English. Readers today often know her through works such as The Wood-Carver of 'Lympus, A Daughter of the Rich, and Flamsted Quarries, books that show her strong attachment to New England settings and character-driven storytelling.

She died in Wellesley, Massachusetts, on June 14, 1938. Though less widely known now than some of her contemporaries, her work still offers a vivid window into regional American fiction of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.