Portrait of Katherine Anne Porter, 1919

Portrait of Katherine Anne Porter, 1919

Portrait of Katherine Anne Porter, 1919. In 1918, Katherine Anne Porter was a 28-year-old newspaper reporter working in Denver, Colorado when she was stricken with flu. Porter’s death seemed certain. Her family had made preparations for her funeral, and the newspaper had already written her obituary. Amazingly, Porter recovered, but her sweetheart, Lieutenant Alexander Barclay, died of influenza. Porter said her experiences during the pandemic, “…simply divided my life.” She fictionized her experiences during the 1918 pandemic in her short novel Pale Horse, Pale Rider.

Katherine Anne Porter papers, Special Collections and University Archives, University of Maryland