orig. Kate Douglas Smith
born Sept. 28, 1856, Philadelphia, Pa., U.S.
died Aug. 24, 1923, Harrow, Middlesex, Eng.
U.S. novelist and a leader of the kindergarten movement in the U.S. After moving to San Francisco she headed the Silver Street Kindergarten (1878), the first free kindergarten on the U.S. West Coast, and helped establish the California Kindergarten Training School.
To help support the school she began writing novels for both adults and children. She is best remembered for the children's classic Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm (1903).