Elizabeth Borton de Trevino was born in Bakersfield, California, on September 2, 1904, to Fred Ellsworth Borton, a lawyer, and Carrie Borton. Her first home was a four-room wooden cottage, from which the Bortons moved across town in about 1909 in order for Fred to be closer to his office in the Producer's Bank Building. In 1910 Elizabeth contracted malaria, and she began spending her summers with her grandmother in the healthier climate near the ocean. Elizabeth's parents and her grandmother all enjoyed reading and encouraged her to read; she spent many hours in the public library. Her father, in particular, encouraged her to write, teaching her the self-discipline necessary for successful writing. When young Elizabeth's first poem was published in the Monterey Peninsula Herald in 1912, she knew that she wanted to be a professional writer.

In 1925 Trevino graduated with a bachelor of arts degree in Latin American...