Mary Roberts Rinehart —
The American “Agatha Christie”
Born on August 12, 1876 in Allegheny City, Pennsylvania, Mary Roberts Rinehart started writing as a way to earn income after a heavy stock market loss in 1903. A trained nurse, wife and mother of three sons, prolific and dedicated to her art, she wrote The Circular Staircase in 1908. The book sold over a million copies and propelled Rinehart to national fame.
A regular contributor to the Saturday Evening Post, Rinehart served as the first woman war correspondent to the Belgian front during WWI. In 1929, she helped her sons found the publishing house Farrar & Rinehart, serving as its director. In hundreds of short stories, Rinehart developed enduring series characters like Letitia (Tish) Carberry and Nurse-Detective Hilda Adams (Miss Pinkerton). She is credited with inventing the phrase ‘The Butler Did It’ from her novel The Door (1930), and many of her books and plays were adapted into movies including I Take This Woman starring Gary Cooper and Carole Lombard (1931).
In 1947, Rinehart was involved in a bizarre personal drama at her Bar Harbor home.
She was reading in her library when her Filipino chef Reyes came in, objecting to her orders. Pulling out a gun, Reyes shot her at point blank range. The gun misfired and Rinehart ran for help. A stranger standing at the door was
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looking for work. “Young man,” Rinehart reportedly said, “You’ll have to come back later. There is a man here trying to kill me.” Wielding a carving knife in each hand, the enraged chef attacked her again before being subdued by the other servants. Reyes was arrested, and hung himself in his cell. Rinehart paid for the funeral.
Recognizing her long contribution to the mystery field, The Mystery Writers of America awarded Mary Roberts Rinehart a Special Edgar in 1954. She died on September 22, 1958, and is buried in Arlington National Cemetery. |
