Carter, Katherine Pollard

Native Texan, Katherine Pollard attended the University of Texas at Austin, where she actively participated in student publications, and received a bachelor’s degree in journalism in 1922. She spent two years as a graduate student at Columbia University in New York City, N.Y., but left before receiving a master’s degree. Soon after returning to her family in Bay City, Texas, Pollard found work in Houston, employed consecutively as ad manager for The Woman’s Viewpoint, Assistant New Business Manager for Houston Land and Trust Co., and in public relations for Will Hogg’s Forum of Civics, a civic improvements promotional organization. During this time she also served as publicity chairman for the American Bank Women’s convention held in Houston in 1927 and helped found the Women’s Flying Club of Houston.

Depression era cutbacks caused Pollard to become a teacher, first in Houston and later in Bay City. In 1938, she married Kenneth Innes Carter, a Bay City farmer. During World War II, the couple lived in Palacios, where she served a short time as the Secretary of the Palacios Chamber of Commerce. After the war, they returned to Bay City and she to teaching. Commuting to Houston on weekends, Katherine earned her masters degree in Education in 1951 from the University of Houston. She wrote for various local newspapers and a radio station until stopping to write several books about Christian miracles, including Hand on the Helm (1972), Heard in Heaven (1975), and The Outstretched Arm . Kenneth died in 1977, and Katherine in 1989.

Sources:

Katherine Pollard Carter Papers, 1921-1988, Dolph Briscoe Center for American History, University of Texas at Austin.

Handbook of Texas Online, s.v. Carter, Katherine Pollard, http://www.tshaonline.org /handbook/online/articles/CC/fcabv.html (accessed August 9, 2010).

From the guide to the Carter, Katherine Pollard, Papers 82-214; 82-254; 84-112; 85-053; 86-152; 87-120; 87-247; 87-277; 87-295; 88-032; 88-131; 88-211; 88-363., 1921-1988, (Dolph Briscoe Center for American History, The University of Texas at Austin)