Margaret Mitchell

Margaret Mitchell, an American author of the enormously popular novel Gone with the Wind (1936), a story about the Civil War and Reconstruction as seen from the southern point of view, was born on Tuesday, November 8, 1900. Margaret’s mother, Maybelle, was a tall woman with red hair and blue eyes. She was the president of one of Atlanta’s most active groups which was interested in women’s rights. Eugene Mitchell saw his wife with astonished admiration. He was part of a successful law firm, in partnership with his brother Gordon. Eugene was an expert in the history of Atlanta, liked reading, and was a clever businessman. Margaret loved her father dearly, but she saw little of him. Weekends were dedicated to his books. He was the president of the Young Men’s Library Association. Margaret began to read books in the family library. Maybelle urged her to read War and Peace by Tolstoy. Margaret was thirteen when it was announced that the war in Europe was real. During the war Margaret worked in a refuge centre. There she tried to reunite lost children with their families. Margaret’s mother died in 1919 and she returned home to keep house for her father and brother. Maybelle had always been the one who pushed Margaret to continue her education. But with her passing, it no longer seemed important. A few years after Maybelle’s death women were granted the right to vote. Margaret was not sure how to take this freedom. She didn’t know how to be a new woman. By 1924, Margaret had already been the leading feature writer in the Atlanta Journal. She was a respected newspaper woman, a well-known personality, a star reporter and her name and face were familiar to all the newspaper readers. Margaret wrote steadily. The name Pansy O’Hara was invented for her heroine. Margaret said the character in no way was autobiographical.