Kate Douglas Wiggin, who is remembered for her achievement in writing children's books and popular sentimental novels for adults, for helping to establish the first free kindergarten west of the Rockies, and for spending many years in the training of kindergarten teachers, was born in Philadelphia, 28 September 1856. Her mother, Helen Elizabeth Dyer Smith, was descended from the Knights and the Dyers, who had lived several generations in Maine. Her father, Robert Noah Smith, who was born in Providence, Rhode Island, held a bachelor's degree from Brown University and a law degree from Harvard University. A brilliant and promising lawyer, he was practicing successfully in Philadelphia when his daughters, Kate and Nora, were born. Robert Smith died suddenly on a business trip when Kate was three. Although she lost her father at such an early age, she later indicated that his qualities of mind and spirit were an abiding...