Louisa May Alcott
Louisa May Alcott (November 29, 1832March 6, 1888) was an American novelist, short story writer and poet best known as the author of the novel "Little Women" (1868) and its sequels "Little Men" (1871) and "Jo's Boys" (1886).
Raised in New England by her transcendentalist parents, Abigail May and Amos Bronson Alcott, she grew up among many of the well-known intellectuals of the day, such as Ralph Waldo Emerson, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Henry David Thoreau, and Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.
Alcott's family suffered from financial difficulties, and while she worked to help support the family from an early age, she also sought an outlet in writing.
She began to receive critical success for her writing in the 1860s.
Early in her career, she sometimes used the pen name A. M. Barnard, under which she wrote novels for young adults that focused on spies and revenge.
Published in 1868, "Little Women" is set in the Alcott family home, Orchard House, in Concord, Massachusetts, and is loosely based on Alcott's childhood experiences with her three sisters, Abigail May Alcott Nieriker, Elizabeth Sewall Alcott, and Anna Alcott Pratt.
The novel was well-received at the time and is still a popular children's novel today.
It has been adapted many times to the stage, film, and television.
Alcott was an abolitionist and a feminist and remained unmarried throughout her life.
She died from a stroke, two days after her father died, in Boston on March 6, 1888.
Elizabeth Sewall Alcott
Elizabeth Sewall" Lizzie" Alcott( June 24, 1835 – March 14, 1858) was one of the two younger sisters of Louisa May Alcott.
She was born in 1835 and died at the age of 22.
Trini Alvarado
Trinidad" Trini" Alvarado( born January 10, 1967) is an American actress best known for her performances as Margaret" Meg" March in the 1994 film adaptation of Louisa May Alcott's novel" Little Women" and Lucy Lynskey in the comedy/ horror film" The Frighteners".
She also has had notable stage performances and singing roles in musicals.
Abigail May Alcott Nieriker
Abigail May Alcott Nieriker( July 26, 1840 – December 29, 1879) was an American artist and the youngest sister of Louisa May Alcott.
She was the basis for the character Amy( an anagram of May) in her sister's semi-autobiographical novel" Little Women"( 1868).
She was named after her mother, Abigail May, and first called Abba, then Abby, and finally May, which she asked to be called in November 1863 when in her twenties.
Joseph Palmer (communard)
Joseph Palmer( 1791–1873) was a member of the Fruitlands commune and an associate of Louisa May Alcott and other Transcendentalists.
Eve LaPlante
Eve LaPlante is a New Englander who has written many articles, essays, and non-fiction books.
Married with four children, she writes nonfiction books, one of which, Salem Witch Judge, won the 2008 Massachusetts Book Award for Nonfiction.
LaPlante's ancestor biographies" have been praised as reminiscent of a more celebratory Nathaniel Hawthorne", according to the Boston Book Festival.
In the anthology" Boston", which includes the preface to LaPlante's American Jezebel, Shaun O'Connell observed," Just as Nathaniel Hawthorne dug into the dark history of his ancestry, which reached back both to the original Boston settlement of the 1630s and the Salem Witch Trials of the 1690s, so too did LaPlante trace family members who were rooted in the same eras ...
Hawthorne took shame upon himself for the misdeeds of his Puritan ancestors, and LaPlante offers praise for her forebears who testified against Puritan repression.
As her prefaces to these biographies, a kind of spiritual autobiography, show, Anne Hutchinson and Samuel Sewall were not the dark Puritans many imagined them to be.
They remain living presences, even models of rectitude, into the twenty- first century."
LaPlante is a first cousin, four generations removed, of Louisa May Alcott through the only daughter( Charlotte May Wilkinson) of Louisa's uncle, the abolitionist and reformer, Samuel Joseph May and his wife Lucretia Flagge Coffin May.
She also collected and edited the private papers of her great great great great- aunt Abby May Alcott, the abolitionist and suffragist who was Louisa's mother and mentor.
These writings were collected and published in 2012, under the title" My Heart Is Boundless: Writings of Abigail May Alcott, Louisa's Mother"( Free Press).
Eve LaPlante also authored a dual biography of Abba May Alcott and Louisa May Alcott entitled:" Marmee& Louisa: The Untold Story of Louisa May Alcott and Her Mother"( Free Press, 2012).
She graduated from Princeton University and received a master's degree in education from Harvard University.
Jane Wigham
Jane Wigham( née Smeal; 1801–1888) was a leading Scottish abolitionist.
She was the stepmother of Eliza Wigham and the second wife of John Wigham.
Amos Bronson Alcott
Amos Bronson Alcott (November 29, 1799March 4, 1888) was an American teacher, writer, philosopher, and reformer.
As an educator, Alcott pioneered new ways of interacting with young students, focusing on a conversational style, and avoided traditional punishment.
He hoped to perfect the human spirit and, to that end, advocated a vegan diet before the term was coined.
He was also an abolitionist and an advocate for women's rights.
Born in Wolcott, Connecticut in 1799, Alcott had only minimal formal schooling before attempting a career as a traveling salesman.
Worried about how the itinerant life might have a negative impact on his soul, he turned to teaching.
His innovative methods, however, were controversial, and he rarely stayed in one place very long.
His most well-known teaching position was at the Temple School in Boston.
His experience there was turned into two books: "Records of a School" and "Conversations with Children on the Gospels".
Alcott became friends with Ralph Waldo Emerson and became a major figure in transcendentalism.
His writings on behalf of that movement, however, are heavily criticized for being incoherent.
Based on his ideas for human perfection, Alcott founded Fruitlands, a transcendentalist experiment in community living.
The project was short-lived and failed after seven months.
Alcott continued to struggle financially for most of his life.
Nevertheless, he continued focusing on educational projects and opened a new school at the end of his life in 1879.
He died in 1888.
Alcott married Abby May in 1830 and they eventually had four surviving children, all daughters.
Their second was Louisa May, who fictionalized her experience with the family in her novel "Little Women" in 1868.
Cornelia Meigs
Cornelia Lynde Meigs( 1884–1973) was an American writer of fiction and biography for children, teacher of English and writing, historian and critic of children's literature.
She won the Newbery Medal for her 1933 biography of Louisa May Alcott, entitled" Invincible Louisa".
She also wrote three Newbery Honor Books.
Isabel Lamon
Isabel Lamon( December 1898 – 1958), also billed as Isabel Baring was an American actress in silent films.
Among many roles, she played Meg March in the first filmed adaptation of Louisa May Alcott's" Little Women."

Question: Who is Louisa May Alcott's mother?