Some Biographical and Bibliographic Notes on Elinore Cowan Stone

    Elinore “Nellie” Rose Cowan was born March 22, 1883 in Adrian, MI, the daughter of John F. and Rebecca Caroline (McClaskey) Cowan. She was the eldest of four children. Her father was a minister.

    My choice for her birth year is based mainly on the 1900 US Census record. For it is in that census that people were required to give the month and year of birth. Although women were more inclined to make themselves younger by shaving off a year or two or more when reporting to the census taker, this habit was not restricted to women alone, as will be shown in a forthcoming note on Edwin Dial Torgerson.

    Through past ventures into genealogical research, I’d say that if a young lady had not reached her 20th birthday by 1900, then the accuracy of the 1900 Census would be most reliable. Bolstering my selection of her birth date is the fact that in the North Carolina Death Index, her birth date is given as 1883. Such information is usually supplied by a surviving family member, who, in this case, would have been her husband.

    Ms. Cowan was educated at Brighton High School (Boston, MA), Mt. Holyoke College (South Hadley, MA), Emerson School of Expression (Boston, MA) and the University of California. She taught at various high schools, private schools, Oahu College in Honolulu, Hawaii and the University of Colorado.

    In 1915, she married Clarence Arthur Stone. By 1917, they were living in New Mexico. As presented previously on this blog, the rest of her story is summed up in that newspaper announcement of her reaching her 90th birthday, March 22, 1973. She died on November 30, 1974.

    Some Additional Bibliographic Notes.

Contributions to periodicals:

Ain’t She the Beautiful, Woman’s Home Companion, June 1927
Alibi of Salvador, Collier’s Magazine, Aug. 8, 1925
Angela and the Fierce Cally Hope, Woman’s Home Companion, Sep. 1925
The Christmas Lamb, Good Housekeeping, Jan. 1935
Dirty Work at the Crossroads, American Magazine, Aug. 1931
The Fabric of Royalty, Good Housekeeping, Sep. 1926
An Hour Before Dinner, Collier’s Magazine, Dec. 18, 1926
José the Onlocky, Woman’s Home Companion, May 1925
A Little Black Box, Woman’s Home Companion, Jan. 1928
The Making of a Journalist, Woman’s Home Companion, Mar. 1929
The Mama of Manuelito, Century Magazine, Apr. 1923
No Dogs Allowed, The Delineator, July 1931
No Pumpkin Pie for Reckless Guys, Woman’s Home Companion, Nov. 1927
The Phantom of the Wagon Trains, Ladies’ Home Journal, Aug. 1924
A Question of Precedence, Woman’s Home Companion, Mar. 1925
Smoke, Good Housekeeping, July 1929
Somewhere in Russia, Woman’s Home Companion, Jan. 1925
Viva Oncle Sam!, Good Housekeeping, Oct. 1927
What Do We Wear?, Century Magazine, Sep. 1922
White Lilacs, Good Housekeeping, May 1929

    Contributions to newspapers:

Note: This part I found most difficult to obtain on-line as most of the newspapers that were presented on-line were partial runs. There were two that were short stories and it was no problem to cite the sources. But in the case of serials, there were only partial runs of the newspaper. The serials were syndicated by NEA Services, Inc. and ran in many different papers throughout the US. But some did not appear on the same dates and some did not appear in other newspapers serviced by NEA. I suppose it was up to each editor to decide which serials would run in his newspaper and when. The stories are chronologically arranged and those that are criminous in nature are denoted by *.

*Applied Science (ss) appeared in Every Week Magazine, in this instance a Sunday
supplement to the Lima (OH) Sunday News, Jan. 14, 1934.

*Two in a Fog (ss) appeared in the Fitchburg (MA) Sentinel, Oct 3, 1936

Belated Holiday (serial), at least Dec. 1937 and Jan . 1938

Love Laughs at the Doctor (serial) Mar. and Apr. 1938

Intern Trouble (serial) July and Aug. 1938

No Time to Marry (serial) Jan. and Feb. 1939

*Murder on the Boardwalk (serial) Aug. and Sep. 1939

*Footsteps in the Fog (serial) June and July 1941

        © Victor A. Berch, 2007