Harriette Arnow: The Spokesperson for Impoverished Appalachian Dwellers

Many times talented teachers earn recognition in fields other than education. One such educator was Harriette Arnow, a public school teacher who also earned fame as an American novelist.

Harriette has been called spokesperson on the people of the southern Appalachian Mountains, although she loved cities and spent important periods of her life in both Cincinnati, Detroit, and Ann Arbor. This remarkable woman was born on July 7, 1908, in Monticello, Kentucky. She was the daughter of two teachers, and decided to pursue a career in teaching for herself. But she also wanted to write. After her high school graduation, Harriette attended Berea College in Kentucky for two years before transferring to the University of Louisville.

Following her college graduation, this talented woman worked for two years as a teacher in rural Pulaski County, and then one year in a more remote area of Appalachia. She then relocated to Cincinnati, Ohio, where she began publishing her short stories. In 1936, Harriette published her first novel, Mountain Path, basing it on her experiences as a teacher.

Harriet lived in Cincinnati from 1934 to 1939, working for the Federal Writer's Project of the WPA, where she met her future husband, Harold B. Arnow, the son of Jewish immigrants. After their marriage, they lived briefly in Pulaski County, close to where Harriette was born. While in Pulaski County, she  continued to work as a public school teacher. In 1944, the couple moved to Detroit, Michigan, accepting housing in a public housing complex. During this time, her 1949 novel, Hunter's Horn, became a best seller and received considerable critical acclaim, finishing close to A Fable written by William Faulkner in that year's voting for the Pulitzer Prize.

In 1950, Harriette and her husband relocated to Ann Arbor, Michigan. There she published her most famous work, The Dollmaker, in 1954. The novel was about an impoverished Kentucky family forced by economic necessity to move to Detroit. The plot reflected her own life story, but it also depicted the experiences of many people living in the Appalachians who migrated to the industrialized north to seek a better life.

Harriette Arnow, remarkable teacher and talented author, died in 1986 at the age of 77, at her farm in Washtenaw County, Michigan.