Background
Her father owned a sawmill and was killed by a disgruntled former employee when she was nine, so her mother had to support four children through music lessons and selling preserves.
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Irita Bradford Doren
Edit ProfileEducation
She graduated from the Florida State College for Women in 1908. She studied at Columbia University for her doctorate in English while teaching part-time at Hunter College.
Career
Born Irita Bradford in Birmingham, Alabama, her family moved to Tallahassee, Florida when she was four. She became assistant to Stuart Sherman, book editor of the New York Herald Tribune, in 1924 and succeeded him when he died in 1926. She held this post until 1963 and became an influential and prominent figure in American letters.
Due to a mutual interest in southern history (Van Doren was the granddaughter of Union General William T H Brooks), she met Wendell Willkie, the Republican presidential nominee in 1940.
Publicly good friends, they carried on a lengthy romantic affair. She introduced him to the literary world and assisted in writing his speeches and books
The Irita Van Doren Book Award was established in 1960 by the publisher of the Herald Tribune. Despite the urging of many, she never penned her memoirs, referring to herself as "the nonwriting Van Doren".
Achievements
Connections
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Born
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Died
December 18, 1966 (aged 75) -
Nationality
United States