Romance Stephens, Ann S: A Noble Woman. v1. 17 Nov 2013

[crutledge]

Ann Sophia Stephens (1810–1886) was an American novelist and magazine editor. She was the author of dime novels and is credited as the progenitor of that genre. Ann Sophia Stephens was born on March 30, 1810 in Derby, Connecticut, She was the daughter of Ann and John Winterbotham, brother of William Winterbotham. He was the manager of a woolen mill owned by Col. David Humphreys. Her mother died early and she was brought up by her mother's sister, who eventually became her stepmother. She was educated at a dame school in South Britain, Connecticut and started writing at an early age. She married Edward Stephens, a printer from Plymouth, Massachusetts, in 1831 and they relocated to Portland, Maine. The actress Clara Bloodgood was the daughter of their son, Edward Stephens, a well known New York lawyer.

Excerpt
She was eighteen years old and would graduate in a few weeks, yet Elsie looked like a child, lying there in that little white bed, with her golden curls scattered on the pillow and the soft whiteness of her neck and hands shaded by the delicate Valenciennes with which her night robe was profusely decorated. A quantity of hot house flowers lay scattered on the counterpane, where the girl had flung them, one by one, from a bouquet she was still tearing to pieces. A frown was on her pretty forehead, and her large violet eyes shone feverishly. It was seldom anything half so lovely appeared in the confined sleeping rooms of that highly fashionable boarding school. Indeed, since its foundation it is doubtful if a creature half so beautiful as Elsie Mellen had ever slept within its walls.

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