Humanities › History & Culture Katharine Lee Bates Print Bachrach/Getty Images History & Culture Women's History Important Figures History Of Feminism Key Events Women's Suffrage Women & War Laws & Womens Rights Feminist Texts American History African American History African History Ancient History and Culture Asian History European History Genealogy Inventions Latin American History Medieval & Renaissance History Military History The 20th Century View More By Jone Johnson Lewis Jone Johnson Lewis Women's History Writer B.A., Mundelein College M.Div., Meadville/Lombard Theological School Jone Johnson Lewis is a women's history writer who has been involved with the women's movement since the late 1960s. She is a former faculty member of the Humanist Institute. Learn about our Editorial Process Updated on June 04, 2019 Katharine Lee Bates, a poet, scholar, educator, and writer, is known for writing "America the Beautiful" lyrics. She's also known, though less widely, as a prolific poet and for her scholarly works of literary criticism, A professor of English and head of the English Department at Wellesley College who had been a student there in her earlier years, Bates was a pioneer faculty member helping build Wellesley's reputation and thereby the reputation of women's higher education. She lived from August 12, 1859, to March 28, 1929. Early Life and Teaching Her father, a Congregational minister, died when Katharine was less than a month old. Her brothers had to go to work to help support the family, but Katharine was given an education. She received her B.A. from Wellesley College in 1880. She wrote to supplement her income. "Sleep" was published by The Atlantic Monthly during her undergraduate years at Wellesley. Bates' teaching career was the central interest of her adult life. She believed that through literature, human values could be revealed and developed. America the Beautiful Read More Julia Ward Howe Biography By Jone Johnson Lewis A trip to Colorado in 1893 and the view from Pikes Peak inspired Katharine Lee Bates to write the poem, "America the Beautiful," which was published in The Congregationalist two years after she wrote it. The Boston Evening Transcript published a revised version in 1904, and the public adopted the idealistic poem quickly. Active Involvements Katharine Lee Bates helped found the New England Poetry Club in 1915 and served for a time as its president, and she was involved in a few social reform activities, working for labor reform and planning the College Settlements Association with Vida Scudder. She was raised in the Congregational faith of her ancestors; as an adult, she was deeply religious but could not find a church in whose faith she could be certain. Partnership Katharine Lee Bates lived for twenty-five years with Katharine Coman in a committed partnership that has sometimes been described as a "romantic friendship." Bates wrote, after Coman died, "So much of me died with Katharine Coman that I'm sometimes not quite sure whether I'm alive or not." Background, Family Mother: Cornelia Frances Lee, teacher, a graduate of Mount Holyoke Seminary (later known as Mount Holyoke College) Father: William Bates, Congregational minister, studied at Middlebury College, Vermont, and Andover Theological Seminary, Massachusetts Katharine Lee Bates was the youngest daughter Companion: Katharine Coman (professor at Wellesley, died 1915) Children: none Education Wellesley College, A.B. 1880Oxford 1889-90Wellesley, A.M. 1891 Bibliography Sherr, Lynn. America the Beautiful: The Stirring True Story Behind Our Nation's Favorite Song. 2001. Sunshine and Other Verses for Children - 1890America the Beautiful and Other Poems - 1911Retinue and Other Poems - 1918Burgess, D. W. B. - 1952 biographyYounger, Barbara. Purple Mountain Majesties: The Story of Katharine Lee Bates and 'America the Beautiful.' Illustrated by Stacey Shuett. Grades 3-5. America the Beautiful. Illustrated by Neil Waldman. Ages 4-8. America the Beautiful. Illustrated by Wendell Minor. America the Beautiful Illustrated by Chris Gall. Grades 1-7. Cite this Article Format mla apa chicago Your Citation Lewis, Jone Johnson. "Katharine Lee Bates." ThoughtCo, Aug. 26, 2020, thoughtco.com/katharine-lee-bates-biography-3530877. Lewis, Jone Johnson. (2020, August 26). Katharine Lee Bates. Retrieved from https://www.thoughtco.com/katharine-lee-bates-biography-3530877 Lewis, Jone Johnson. "Katharine Lee Bates." ThoughtCo. https://www.thoughtco.com/katharine-lee-bates-biography-3530877 (accessed May 4, 2024). copy citation