Bates, Arlo, 1850–1918.

Kunitz, Stanley and Howard Haycraft, eds. American Authors, 1600–1900. New York: H.W. Wilson Co., 1938. Biographical information for George L. Vose was obtained from the collection.

A novelist, poet, and teacher, Arlo Bates was born in East Machias, Maine, on December 16, 1850 to Dr. Niran Bates and Susan Thaxter Bates. He studied at Bowdoin College where he earned a Bachelor’s degree in 1876 and a Master’s degree in 1879. He received an honorary Litt.D in 1894.

Bates began writing while still a student at Bowdoin, and for a year after graduation, he painted china, tutored, and even worked as a clerk in a metal foundary. Eventually, he was offered the position of editor of the Boston Sunday Courier where he remained until 1893.

In 1882, he married Harriet Lenora Vose who was herself a published writer under the pseudonym, Eleanor Putnum. They collaborated on a novel, Prince Vance, published in 1886. Later that year, Harriet passed away, and every volume Bates published thereafter is dedicated to her. The couple had one son, Oric.

In 1893, Bates accepted a position as professor of English at Massachusettes Institute of Technology, where he stayed until his retirement in 1915. During this time, Bates lectured extensively and wrote several textbooks, including Talks on Writing English (1896); Talks on the Studies of Literature (1906); and Talks on Teaching Literature (1906).

Bates is the author of fourteen novels, including Patty’s Perversities (1881); A Lad’s Love (1887); In the Bundle of Time (1893); The Diary of a Saint (1902); and The Intoxicated Ghost (1908). In addition, Bates published seven volumes of poetry, including The Berries of the Briar (1886); Under the Beech Tree (1899); and Sonnet in Shadow (1887), a dirge in memory of his wife.

Bates passed away on August 24, 1918.

A note in the collection indicates that George Leonard Vose was the father of Bates’ wife, Harriet Lenora Vose. Bates and Harriet were married in 1882 and had one son, Oric. Harriet passed away in 1886. As indicated by the collection., Bates and his father-in-law remained close; in letters to his sister-in-law Persis N. Andrews, Vose frequently wrote about Bates and his success in the literary marketplace. In a 1901 letter to Andrews, Vose expressed his pride in his grandson Oric, then a freshman at Harvard University.

Vose himself was an academic; he was a highly respected professor of civil engineering at Bowdoin College where he authored a handbook for engineers, A Manual for Railroad Engineers and Engineering Students .

From the guide to the Arlo Bates and George L. Vose papers, 1879–1916, (University of Delaware Library - Special Collections)