There are very few who are not acquainted with “Little Lord
Fauntleroy,” one of the sweetest children’s stories ever written, but
not so many perhaps are acquainted with the interesting life story of
its author, Frances Hodgson Burnett. She was born November 24, 1849,
in Manchester, England, and while yet attending school she developed a
talent for writing short stories and poems and even novels. When her
father died her mother brought the family to America in 1865, settling
at Newmarket, but a year later removing to Knoxville, Tennessee. She
then completed a story which was planned in her thirteenth year, and
succeeded in disposing of it to Godey’s Lady’s Book, in which it was
published in 1867. Other interesting short stories followed in this and
in Peterson’s Magazine, but the turning point of her literary success
was “Surly Tim’s Trouble,” which appeared in Scribner’s Monthly in
1872, attracting a great deal of attention. At the invitation of the
editor more of her publications were published in Scribner’s, one of
the most popular being “That Lass o’ Lowries,” which appeared later in
1877 in book form. Mrs. Hodgson has been twice married, the first time,
in 1873, to Dr. Swan M. Burnett, from whom she obtained a divorce in
1898, and the second time, in 1900, to Stephen Townsend, an English
author. Mrs. Burnett, by winning a suit against the unauthorized
dramatization of “Fauntleroy,” secured for authors of England the
control of dramatic rights in their stories, for which Reade and
Dickens had spent thousands of pounds in vain.