Kate Douglas Wiggin

Kate Douglas Wiggin was an American author and educator born on September 28, 1856, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. She was the youngest of five children and grew up in a family that valued education and literature. Her father, Robert N. Smith, was a successful merchant, and her mother, Helen E. Smith, was a writer and poet. Wiggin attended the Moravian Seminary for Young Ladies in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, and later the Abbott Academy in Andover, Massachusetts. She then went on to study at the California State Normal School in San Francisco, where she trained to become a kindergarten teacher. In 1880, Wiggin moved to Santa Barbara, California, where she opened the first free kindergarten in the state. She later founded the Silver Street Free Kindergarten in San Francisco, which became a model for kindergartens across the country. Wiggin's first book, The Birds' Christmas Carol, was published in 1886 and became an instant success. The book tells the story of a young girl named Carol who is born on Christmas Day