Deland, Margaret: An Old Chester Secret. v1. 27 Jul 2013
 

Margaret Deland (nee Margaretta Wade Campbell) (February 23, 1857 - January 13, 1945) was an American novelist, short-story writer, and poet. She also wrote an autobiography in two volumes.
She was born in Allegheny, Pennsylvania (today a part of Pittsburgh). In 1880 she married Lorin F. Deland. They took in and supported unmarried mothers; it was at this period she began to write. Her poetry collection The Old Garden was published in 1886. Deland received a Litt.D. from Bates College in 1920.
She is known principally for the novel John Ward, Preacher (1888), and her 'Old Chester' books, based on her early memories of Maple Grove and Manchester, Pittsburgh communities where she grew up.

Excerpt
THERE was not a person in Old Chester less tainted by the vulgarity of secretiveness than Miss Lydia Sampson. She had no more reticence than sunshine or wind, or any other elemental thing. How much of this was due to conditions it would be hard to say; certainly there was no "reticence" in her silence as to her neighbors' affairs; she simply didn't know them!