Ardyth Kennelly
Encyclopedia
Ardyth Kennelly was a female American
novelist noted for her love- and romance
-themed publications in the 1940s and 1950s.
on April 15, 1912, and grew up in Glenada, Salt Lake City, Utah
, and Albany, Oregon
. She graduated from Albany High School
and from Oregon State College
in 1933. In 1940, she married Dr. Egon V. Ullman of Portland, Oregon
; she was widowed in 1962. She lived for 40 years in downtown Portland where she held occasional salons and hosted diverse gatherings of selected guests.
in 1930. Between September of that year and January 1936, she published a total of 28 poems and five short stories in this The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS) periodical. Although the majority of this work is considered sentimental and focused on love and romance, sub-themes appear as well, hinting at the insight into mature love, motherhood, death, and the restorative working of faith and nature (including human nature) that are expressed in The Peaceable Kingdom.
For the most part, Kennelly's Improvement Era work is considered naive and conventional in structure and plot. The poems are almost uniformly about romantic love. The stories typically end happily, but are varied in theme. How Lovely Youth focuses exclusively on young love; it concerns a young man returning from his two-year Church missionary work. Some Beautiful Way is about motherhood and step-motherhood, and the convergence of the internal realities of a little girl and her stepmother. And Afterward Came Spring is about death and a crisis of faith; given Kennelly's sub-themes in The Peaceable Kingdom, it's notable that in this story nature, rather than doctrine, brings about "proof" and resolution.
Fire and Song is, in the words of its author, "a story of faith". However, she states, "I'm nineteen. I tell you because I want you to understand if this tremendous theme is handled clumsily and a little too breathlessly."
Kennelly's remaining story, That Day Was Grand, 1935, is told from the point of view of a very young schoolgirl who idolizes a woman whom she considers the epitome of female beauty and perfection, and possessed of that ineffable quality of "cool." In the story, Kennelly reveals the character Rose's egotism, unattractive lifestyle and taste, slovenliness, shallow values and poor judgment, and her likely fate should she continue to walk the path she has chosen. Rose is not evil by any means (Kennelly does not appear to believe in human evil, or at least she never dwells on it), but she is dangerous to herself and dangerous to young Laurel through the influence she could so easily exert if not for the watchfulness and wisdom of Laurel's mother and grandmother. Rose's character is revealed through Laurel's words and the words of others as Laurel reports them.
All-Story Love Stories. She published a total of five romance short stories from 1936 to 1940 in All-Story Love Stories and Street & Smith's Love Story Magazine. The stories themselves are lost, unless surviving issues containing them can be located.) The poor paper quality that pulp periodicals are known for, combined with their age, yields a poor prognosis for success. However, it is possible to gain some idea of the nature of the periodicals themselves by viewing a few surviving examples of cover art for each magazine.
.
s and mixed media constructions. She had two major exhibits. The first was at the Elizabeth Leach Gallery when Kennelly was 84 (approximately 1996), and the Mark Woolley gallery, in Portland, hosted an exhibit in 2000.
Toward the end of her life Kennelly moved to Vancouver
to be near her sister, and died there on January 19, 2005 at the age of 92.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
novelist noted for her love- and romance
Romance novel
The romance novel is a literary genre developed in Western culture, mainly in English-speaking countries. Novels in this genre place their primary focus on the relationship and romantic love between two people, and must have an "emotionally satisfying and optimistic ending." Through the late...
-themed publications in the 1940s and 1950s.
Life
Kennelly was born in Glenada, OregonGlenada, Oregon
Glenada is an unincorporated community in Lane County, Oregon, United States, across the Siuslaw River from the city of Florence on U.S. Route 101.-History:...
on April 15, 1912, and grew up in Glenada, Salt Lake City, Utah
Salt Lake City, Utah
Salt Lake City is the capital and the most populous city of the U.S. state of Utah. The name of the city is often shortened to Salt Lake or SLC. With a population of 186,440 as of the 2010 Census, the city lies in the Salt Lake City metropolitan area, which has a total population of 1,124,197...
, and Albany, Oregon
Albany, Oregon
Albany is the eleventh largest city in the U.S. state of Oregon, and is the county seat of Linn County. It is located in the Willamette Valley at the confluence of the Calapooia River and the Willamette River in both Linn and Benton counties, just east of Corvallis and south of Salem. It is...
. She graduated from Albany High School
West Albany High School
West Albany High School is a public high school in Albany, Oregon, United States.West Albany High School was formerly named Albany Union High School prior to the completion of South Albany High School in 1972.-Academics:...
and from Oregon State College
Oregon State University
Oregon State University is a coeducational, public research university located in Corvallis, Oregon, United States. The university offers undergraduate, graduate and doctoral degrees and a multitude of research opportunities. There are more than 200 academic degree programs offered through the...
in 1933. In 1940, she married Dr. Egon V. Ullman of Portland, Oregon
Portland, Oregon
Portland is a city located in the Pacific Northwest, near the confluence of the Willamette and Columbia rivers in the U.S. state of Oregon. As of the 2010 Census, it had a population of 583,776, making it the 29th most populous city in the United States...
; she was widowed in 1962. She lived for 40 years in downtown Portland where she held occasional salons and hosted diverse gatherings of selected guests.
Career
Kennelly's writing career can be divided into three distinct periods:- Improvement Era: 1930 - 1936
- Pulp romance: 1936 - 1940
- Novelist: 1949 - 1956
Improvement Era
Kennelly began her career at the age of 18 with the publication of three poems in Improvement EraImprovement Era
The Improvement Era was an official magazine of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints between 1897 and 1970....
in 1930. Between September of that year and January 1936, she published a total of 28 poems and five short stories in this The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS) periodical. Although the majority of this work is considered sentimental and focused on love and romance, sub-themes appear as well, hinting at the insight into mature love, motherhood, death, and the restorative working of faith and nature (including human nature) that are expressed in The Peaceable Kingdom.
For the most part, Kennelly's Improvement Era work is considered naive and conventional in structure and plot. The poems are almost uniformly about romantic love. The stories typically end happily, but are varied in theme. How Lovely Youth focuses exclusively on young love; it concerns a young man returning from his two-year Church missionary work. Some Beautiful Way is about motherhood and step-motherhood, and the convergence of the internal realities of a little girl and her stepmother. And Afterward Came Spring is about death and a crisis of faith; given Kennelly's sub-themes in The Peaceable Kingdom, it's notable that in this story nature, rather than doctrine, brings about "proof" and resolution.
Fire and Song is, in the words of its author, "a story of faith". However, she states, "I'm nineteen. I tell you because I want you to understand if this tremendous theme is handled clumsily and a little too breathlessly."
Kennelly's remaining story, That Day Was Grand, 1935, is told from the point of view of a very young schoolgirl who idolizes a woman whom she considers the epitome of female beauty and perfection, and possessed of that ineffable quality of "cool." In the story, Kennelly reveals the character Rose's egotism, unattractive lifestyle and taste, slovenliness, shallow values and poor judgment, and her likely fate should she continue to walk the path she has chosen. Rose is not evil by any means (Kennelly does not appear to believe in human evil, or at least she never dwells on it), but she is dangerous to herself and dangerous to young Laurel through the influence she could so easily exert if not for the watchfulness and wisdom of Laurel's mother and grandmother. Rose's character is revealed through Laurel's words and the words of others as Laurel reports them.
Pulp romance
Kennelly's pulp career began the year her Improvement Era contributions ended, in 1936. This year saw the publication of her last poem in the Mormon periodical On A Restless Night, and one of her first mainstream stories, There's No Telling, for the pulp magazinePulp magazine
Pulp magazines , also collectively known as pulp fiction, refers to inexpensive fiction magazines published from 1896 through the 1950s. The typical pulp magazine was seven inches wide by ten inches high, half an inch thick, and 128 pages long...
All-Story Love Stories. She published a total of five romance short stories from 1936 to 1940 in All-Story Love Stories and Street & Smith's Love Story Magazine. The stories themselves are lost, unless surviving issues containing them can be located.) The poor paper quality that pulp periodicals are known for, combined with their age, yields a poor prognosis for success. However, it is possible to gain some idea of the nature of the periodicals themselves by viewing a few surviving examples of cover art for each magazine.
Novelist (1949 - 1956)
Kennelly's first novel, The Peaceable Kingdom, was published in 1949 and sold 500,000 copies. This was followed by four more, with the last published in 1956. These include The Spur (1951), a fictionalized treatment of John Wilkes Booth, and Good Morning Young Lady (1953), a coming of age novel, fictional but including anecdotes based on the life of Butch CassidyButch Cassidy
Robert LeRoy Parker , better known as Butch Cassidy, was a notorious American train robber, bank robber, and leader of the Wild Bunch Gang in the American Old West...
.
Late career
Late in life Kennelly developed a second career as an artist, specializing in collageCollage
A collage is a work of formal art, primarily in the visual arts, made from an assemblage of different forms, thus creating a new whole....
s and mixed media constructions. She had two major exhibits. The first was at the Elizabeth Leach Gallery when Kennelly was 84 (approximately 1996), and the Mark Woolley gallery, in Portland, hosted an exhibit in 2000.
Toward the end of her life Kennelly moved to Vancouver
Vancouver, Washington
Vancouver is a city on the north bank of the Columbia River in the U.S. state of Washington. Incorporated in 1857, it is the fourth largest city in the state with a 2010 census population of 161,791 as of April 1, 2010...
to be near her sister, and died there on January 19, 2005 at the age of 92.
Publications & works
- The Gold Door (?) - Collages / mixed media installations, Mark Woolley Gallery, Portland OR, USA.
- Elizabeth Leach Gallery.
- Marry Me, Carry Me - Houghton Mifflin Company, Boston, 1956, Book
- Up Home - publisher unknown, 1955, Book
- Good Morning, Young Lady - Houghton, Mifflin Co. 1953, Book
- The Spur - Julian Messner, Inc. New York, 1951, Book
- The Peaceable Kingdom - Houghton, Mifflin Co. 1949, Book
- Last Christmas - Street & Smith’s Love Story Magazine, Dec 21, 1940. Story
- My Love is Here for Tea - All-Story Love Stories, Jan 30, 1937. Story
- Now That, At Night - All-Story Love Stories, Mar 28, 1936. Story
- Song About Love - All-Story Love Stories, Mar 7, 1936. Story
- Theres No Telling - All-Story Love Stories, May 30, 1936. Story
- On A Restless Night - Improvement Era, v. 39 no. 1, Jan, 1936. Poem
- On A Long Day - Improvement Era, v. 38 no. 12, Dec, 1935. Poem
- There Wasnt Much - Improvement Era, v.38 no. 10, Oct, 1935. Poem
- Last Straw - Improvement Era, v. 38 no. 7, Jul, 1935. Poem
- That Day Was Grand - Improvement Era, v. 38 no. 5, May, 1935. Story
- Beyond Belief - Improvement Era, v. 37 no. 9, Sep, 1934. Poem
- For the Dark Stranger - Improvement Era, v. 37 no. 7, Jul, 1934. Poem
- Date Tonight - Improvement Era, v. 37 no. 7, Jul, 1934. Poem
- These Things - Improvement Era, v. 37 no. 6, Jun, 1934. Poem
- Inside Story - Improvement Era, v. 37 no. 4, Apr, 1934. Poem
- Some Beautiful Way - Improvement Era, v. 37 no. 2, Feb, 1934. Story
- On the Back of an Envelope - Improvement Era, v. 37 no. 2, Feb, 1934. Poem
- How Lovely Youth - Improvement Era, v. 36 no. 10, Aug, 1933. Story
- Sixteen Sings (set of 10 poems) - Improvement Era, v.36 no. 6, Apr, 1933. Poem
- I Want Peace - Improvement Era, v. 36 no. 5, Mar, 1933. Poem
- Fire and Song - Improvement Era, v. 36 no. 12, Oct, 1932. Story
- Reincarnated - Improvement Era, v. 36 no. 10, Aug, 1932. Poem
- Conversation On A Still Afternoon - Improvement Era, v. 35 no. 6, Apr, 1932. Poem
- And Afterward Came Spring - Improvement Era, v. 35 no. 6, Apr, 1932. Story
- The Color of Yesterday - Improvement Era, v. 35 no. 5, Mar, 1932. Poem
- Song to Your Coming - Improvement Era, v. 34 no. 7, May, 1931. Poem
- The Party - Improvement Era, v. 34 no. 2, Dec, 1930. Poem
- Wish - Improvement Era, v. 33 no. 12, Oct, 1930. Poem
- Shower - Improvement Era, v. 33 no. 11, Sep, 1930. Poem