Octave Thanet (1850–1934)

Octave Thanet was the pen name of Alice French, born in Andover, Massachusetts. Her mother Frances Morton was a daughter of Massachusetts Governor Marcus Morton. In 1856, her father George Henry French moved the family to Davenport, Iowa, where he manufactured agricultural equipment. Alice attended Abbot Academy in Andover and Vassar College in Poughkeepsie, New York. After graduating in 1868, she returned to Davenport. Her first published work was a short story printed in 1871 in the Davenport Gazette. Seven years later, she earned her first money from her writing with an article published in Lippincott’s Magazine. It was at this point that she took the pseudonym "Octave Thanet", which she believed would help her writing career because it was gender-neutral. She published stories and essays in national periodicals such as the Atlantic Monthly, Harper’s, Scribner’s Magazine, and The Century magazine. She also wrote several novels and a work about photography.

Some of her pieces were accounts of her travels in the USA and Great Britain. She had a longtime relationship with Jane Allen Crawford; the two women divided their time between their home in Davenport and Thanford, their plantation in Lawrence County, Arkansas.