Laura Redden Searing
Laura Redden Searing was born February 9, 1939 in Somerset County, Missouri. She was originally named Laura Catherine Redden. Her parents’ names were Wilhelmina Waller Redden and Littleton John Redden. She was the oldest child in her family. She was born hearing, and became Deaf at the age of eleven due to medication that was used to treat meningitis she had contracted. After that, she preferred to communicate primarily by writing things down.
She enrolled into the Missouri School for the Deaf when she was sixteen years old. There, she was able to learn American Sign Language, as well as the American Manual Alphabet. She became one of the school’s best students due to her extraordinary writing skills. She then graduated …show more content…
Louis Presbyterian as an assistant editor and columnist in 1859. She wrote everything under the pen name “Howard Glyndon.” In 1860, she started writing editorials for the St. Louis Republican. They then sent her to document the Civil War in 1861. It was there she published her first book, Notable Men in the House of Representatives. The book was about important men in Congress. Laura was a pro-union loyalist, and she wrote several poems concerning the Civil War. She was also hired to write the lyrics to a song that was sung by the Missouri troops. She even got to interview Abraham Lincoln. Then, in 1864, Laura published her first poetry collection, titled Idyls of Battle and Poems of the Rebellion.
In 1865, she traveled to Europe seeking further education, since she couldn’t go to college. She then learned to write in several languages; French, Spanish, Italian, and German. She also met a man there named Michael George Brennan. She was engaged to him for a short period of time. He died shortly after their engagement, so they never married. About four years after arriving, Laura left Europe and returned back to the United States because she wanted to publish more of her works. She also left because she was struggling with some health