A Brief Biography of Kate Chopin Kate O'Flaherty Chopin was born 8 February 1851 into a prominent family in St.Louis, Missouri. Her father, Thomas O'Flaherty, an Irish immigrant, was a successful St. Louis merchant who was killed in a railroad accident when Kate was only five years old. Kate's mother, Eliza was left a wealthy widow and raised Kate in a household "run by vigorous widows: her mother, grandmother, and great-grandmother . . . a community of women who …showed first 75 words of 759 total…

…showed last 75 words of 759 total…Biography. American Short Story Writers 1880-1910, volume 78. Ed. Bobby Ellen Kimbel. Ann Arbor: Edward Brothers, 1989, pp. 90-109. Reuben, Paul P. "Chapter 6: American Naturalism: Kate Chopin (1851 - 1904)" PAL: Perspective on American Literature - A Research and Reference Guide. WWW URL: http://www.csustan.edu/english/reuben/pal/chap6/chopin.html Toth, Emily. "Kate Chopin," Oxford Companion to Women's Writing in the U.S. Ed. Cathy N. Davidson, Linda Wagner-Martin. New York: Oxford University Press, 1995, pp. 187-188.