Tag Archives: Teacher Authors

Missouri teacher and author Ellen Gray Massey shared her love of the Ozarks

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Ellen Gray Massey, English teacher and prolific author of juvenile fiction, expressed her profound love of the Ozarks in her classroom and in her novels. Photo Credit: ellengraymassey.com

Many talented authors have also worked as dedicated educators. Ellen Gray Massey, a high school English teacher from Missouri, is one of these. She has published numerous award-winning novels and publications with settings in her beloved Ozarks.

Ellen was born on Nov. 14, 1921, in Nevada, Missouri, although she was raised in Washington DC. As a youngster, she spent her summers at the family farm, Wayside, near her birth town of Nevada. While there, she fell in love with the Ozarks, a lifelong appreciation which was reflected in her later writings.

After she graduated from high school, Ellen earned her Bachelor’s degree in English from the University of Maryland. After she married Lane Massey in the 1940s, the couple settled on a farm in Laclede County and started their family. Unfortunately, Lane died while he was still a young man. After his passing, Ellen and her three children ran the farm by themselves.

When Ellen decided she was ready to go into the classroom, she accepted a position as an English teacher at Lebanon High School in Lebanon, Missouri. For ten of the years she taught there, Ellen led her sophomores, juniors, and seniors into the writing and publishing of their own periodical, Bittersweet Magazine. Through this project, her students interviewed older residents around the Ozarks in order to preserve in writing and photographs the history and stories that were dying off with their generation. “She sent those kids out into the boonies interviewing old time Ozarkians about how rough it was, how they made do with what they had, how they embraced the culture. It was wonderful,” remembered friend and fellow author Veda Jones.

After retiring from Lebanon High, Ellen continued to share her vast knowledge of the writing process and her love of the Ozarks at Drury University, where she taught graduate education courses.

Over the course of her lengthy career as an author, Ellen earned numerous accolades for her writing. She won 15 First Place awards from The Missouri Writers Guild and was awarded their annual Best Book Award five times. She also earned three finalist awards from the Western Writers of America. In 2014, she garnered the Western Spur Award in the Juvenile Fiction category for her novel Papa’s Gold. In addition, in 1995, she was one of the charter inductees into the first Writers Hall of Fame of America.

Sadly, Ellen Gray Massey passed away on July 13, 2014, in Lebanon, Missouri, at the age of 92. To learn more about this Chalkboard Champion, visit her website at ellengraymassey.com.

Pioneer, author, and rural schoolteacher Laura Ingalls Wilder

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Pioneer and author Laura Ingalls Wilder wrote the popular Little House series, once worked as a teacher in a rural one-room schoolhouse. Photo Credit: Public Domain

Most Americans have heard of famous author and pioneer Laura Ingalls Wilder. They have either read her Little House books, or they have watched the syndicated television series called Little House on the Prairie, which was based on her books and was popular in the 1970s. But did you know that Laura was once a rural school teacher?

When Laura was a child, her family relocated frequently to wilderness areas, because her father wanted to indulge his desire to settle land in unknown territory. The Ingalls family traveled into thick woods, across vast prairies, through raging rivers, and over icy waters in their covered wagon. Their journeys included settlements in Wisconsin, Missouri, Kansas, Minnesota, and Iowa. Finally, the family settled in De Smet, South Dakota, where her father claimed a homestead. These pioneer experiences became the source material for Laura’s children’s books, which have been read by millions over the 60 years they have been in print.

Laura was only 16 years old in Dec., 1883, when she took an examination with the county school superintendent and was granted her teaching certificate. She taught her first term at the Bouchie school, a rural one-room schoolhouse, that winter. She taught her second term in the spring of 1884, and her final term in the spring of 1885.

Laura’s first teaching job was a difficult one fort her. Her school was located in a small settlement 12 miles away from her family’s home, and she boarded in the home of a family who was always arguing. The students she was expected to teach were nearly her own age, and Laura felt that she had little control over her class. Laura was also very homesick.

After Laura married her husband, Almonzo Wilder, she left the teaching profession. But she continued her work as an educator by home-schooling her one surviving child, Rose Wilder.

Canada’s Uzma Jalaluddin: English teacher, columnist, TV guest, and novelist

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Uzma Jalaluddin, a high school English teacher in Canada, has earned acclaim as a newspaper columnist, television guest, and author of romance novels. Photo Credit: Uzma Jalaluddin

Many exceptional educators have achieved success in fields outside of the classroom. This is true of Uzma Jalaluddin, a high school English teacher who has earned acclaim as a newspaper columnist, novelist, and television guest.

Uzma was born in 1980. Her parents immigrated to Canada from Hyderabad, India. She was raised in Scarborough, a suburb of Toronto, a place that she describes as “one of the most ethnically diverse places on the planet. After earning her degree in English literature from the University of Toronto, she became a high school English teacher at a public school in Toronto, a job she has held since 2003.

Uzma writes regular column about modern Musllim life for Canada’s Toronto Star. The column is entitled Samosas and Maple Syrup. She’s also been a guest on the television show Cityline, speaking on topics related to the Muslim experience. Her debut novel, Ayesha at Last, was published in 2019. The volume has been described as a modern retelling of the Jane Austin novel Pride and Prejudice with a setting in the Muslim community. The effort earned instant acclaim, and was even named the Cosmopolitan UK Book of the Year and a Publisher’s Weekly Best Book of 2019. In addition, this book was long-listed for the Stephen Leacock Medal and the Toronto Book Awards and was short-listed as a Goodreads Reader’s Choice Awards finalist. Her second novel, Hana Khan Carries On, was published in 2021. This book has been described as having been inspired by the blockbuster hit movie You’ve Got Mail, again with a setting in the Muslim community, and was named Best Romance Novel 2021 by the Washington Post.

Uzma credits her upbringing with her success as an author, and she never forgets the value of telling stories. “I grew up surrounded by storytellers; my favorite stories were the ones my mother and my aunts told me, about the strong women they knew in India,” Uzma says. “Like the wealthy widow who used her resources to educate neighborhood women in her own home. Or the female servant who never kept quiet when she witnessed bad behavior,” she continues. “I learned about the power of stories to combat the limiting narratives that are so often used to harm, diminish, and control others. Today I tell stories in my job as a teacher, columnist, and novelist. I do it not just to keep the old tales alive and for the pleasure of making up new stories, but also to remind myself, my children, my readers, who they are and where they come from, and how the stories we listen to influence our lives,” she concludes.

To learn more about this talented teacher and author, click on this link to her website: Uzma Jalaluddin.

NY English teacher Alice Duer Miller was also a suffragist and prolific author

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New York English teacher Alice Duer Miller was also an accomplished mathematician and prolific writer. Photo Credit: Kappa Kappa Gamma

Often teachers can be counted upon to  throw themselves into causes that benefit humanity as a whole. This is true of Alice Duer Miller, an English teacher who became a tireless suffragist.

Alice Duer was born on Staten Island, New York, on July 28, 1874. As a young girl, she enjoyed a privileged upbringing, but the fortunes of her family took a down-turn at about the time she entered college. Even though she was on a limited budget, she was able to study at Barnard College, the women’s institution of higher learning associated with Columbia University. Barnard, founded in 1889, is known as one of the Seven Sister Colleges. Alice earned her degree in 1899, and later she completed graduate courses in mathematics at Columbia. She also studied astronomy and navigation, even becoming the navigator on a friend’s yacht during one summer vacation.

In 1899, Alice married Henry Wise Miller, and the couple emigrated to Costa Rica, where they attempted to establish a rubber farm. Alas, the venture was unsuccessful, and so they returned to the United States. Alice accepted a position as an English Composition teacher at a girls school, while Henry worked at the Stock Exchange. She taught there for several years, tutoring prospective college students in mathematics on the side.

Alice’s hard work was not confined to the classroom. Alice became an ardent suffragist. She penned columns in support of the cause. She also served on the Barnard Board of Trustees from 1922 to 1942. She even co-authored a history of the school entitled Barnard College: The First Fifty Years, which was published in 1939.

Throughout her career as an educator, Alice became a prolific writer and editor. She wrote short stories, poetry, screenplays, and novels.  She published a novel called Come Out of the Kitchen in 1916, and her fiction was frequently adapted to stage and film. She also continued to publish columns, including Are Women People? and Women are People! Her verse novel, The White Cliffs, was adapted into a film. She even dabbled in acting when she appeared in a film production of Soak the Rich. Some of her pieces were published in The Saturday Evening Post, The Ladies Home Journal, and Harper’s Bazaar, and she was listed as an Advisory Editor in the very first issue of The New Yorker Magazine.

As a suffragist, Alice contributed to the cause by writing a column published in the New York Tribune where she released pro-suffrage satirical poems. Later the poems were complied into a book entitled Are Women People? A Book of Rhymes for Suffrage Times (1915). She also became an active member of the Congressional Union for Women Suffrage (CUWS).

During her lifetime, Alice earned many honors. She was made a Curtiss Scholar in Pure Science in her senior year of college, and was inducted into Kappa Kappa Gamma while a student at Barnard, and she became a member of Phi Beta Kappa in 1926. Columbia University gave her a University Medal in 1933, and conferred an honorary doctorate in 1942.

Sadly, Alice Duer Miller passed away on August 22, 1942, following a lengthy illness. She is buried at Evergreen Cemetery in Morristown, New Jersey.

Award-winning author Jacqueline Jules also works as a school librarian

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Virginia school librarian and teacher Jacqueline Jules has earned acclaim as an author of children’s books. Photo Credit: Jacqueline Jules

There are many excellent educators who have earned success in endeavors outside of the classroom. This is true of Jacqueline Jules, a school librarian and teacher from Virginia who has has earned acclaim as an author of children’s books.

Jacqueline was born in 1956 in Petersburg, Virginia. As a young woman, she earned her Bachelor’s degree with a major in Creative Writing from the University of Pittsburgh. In 2001 she earned her Master’s degree in Library Science from the University of Maryland.

Currently, Jacqueline works as a school librarian at Timber Lane Elementary School in Falls Church, Virginia. She also works as a storyteller and as a guest speaker at schools. She has also taught religious school, led Tot Shabbat services, and has experience as a writing resource teacher. Her career as an educator has spanned a total of 28 years. She credits these experiences with her success as an author. “It actually wasn’t until I became a school librarian that I had enough ideas for writing children’s books,” Jacqueline confesses. “My years as a librarian fueled my writing rather than stalled it. Working in a school taught me what children enjoy and what was missing from library shelves,” she continued. “I could never do the writing I do now without having been a teacher,” she concludes.

Jacqueline’s work has appeared in over 100 publications. She has authored more than 50 children’s books, including The Grey Striped Shirt; Once upon a Shabbos; the Zapato Power series; the Sofia Martinez series; Unite or Die: How Thirteen States Became a Nation; Duck for Turkey Day; Never Say a Mean Word Again; Feathers for Peacock; The Hardest Wor; and Pluto is Peeved. Also a poet, Jacqueline is the author of Tag Your Dreams: Poems of Play and Persistence.

For her work as a children’s author, Jacqueline has earned many accolades. She garnered the Arlington Arts Moving Words Contest twice, in 1999 and again in 2007. In 2009, she earned the SCBWI Magazine Merit Plaque for Poetry, and 2008, she received the Best Original Poetry Award from the Catholic Press Association. She has also garnered a citation for Notable Books for Young Readers from the Association of Jewish Libraries in 2002, and that same year she was named a National Jewish Book Award finalist.

To learn more about this amazing educator and author, visit www.jacquelinejules.com.