Hemingway’s second wife, Pauline, graduated from the first School of Journalism in the nation at Columbia, Missouri, a program known for academic rigor and practical training. She enrolled in: History and Principles of Journalism, Reporting, Feature Writing, News Writing, Editorial Writing, and Copy Editing. One of her instructors later served as press secretary for President Truman. Stated goals in the 1918 yearbook:
“Men and women who possess high ideals, mental alertness, clarity of impression and expression, habits of accuracy, and an immense intellectual curiosity—neither sciolists nor pendants—will be more valuable to themselves in journalism because of this possession. They will, also, be more valuable to the community, the commonwealth, the nation, the world—and that’s the why of the School of Journalism.”
—note 10, chapter 3, Unbelievable Happiness and Final Sorrow: The Hemingway–Pfeiffer Marriage, Ruth A. Hawkins, The University of Arkansas Press, 2012
Another Key West legend, albeit less well known, Pauline Pfeiffer Hemingway was born—similar to this early September day—in the 24 hours post new moon which in Iowa time in 1895 occurred the final half hour before midnight Sunday, July 21st (Jove exalting with Venus clinging to the tail of the dragon).
Descending from centuries of brewers from Southern Bavaria, one of her settler grandmothers returned from a Sunday service, “declared beer the work of the devil and opened all the spigots of her husband’s beer casks, flooding the cellar” (note 7, chapter 2), thus ending her husband’s Cedar Falls (near Parkersburg) career as the “town’s first and only brewer.”
The Pfeiffers are known for their strong work ethic, family loyalty, entrepreneurial spirit, and numerous ventures, especially pharmaceutical. From a young age her father showed talent at business and openness to new ideas. He incorporated a lucrative Chicago drugstore product line of expired-copyright books which also introduced him to the world of literature.
Her mother descended from Irish potato famine epoch devout Catholics whose father (Pauline’s grandfather) vowed in America he would have two things in his home: a chapel and a library. At the end of life, his “finest library in Parkersburg” became basis for the Parkersburg Public Library.
Countdown: 20/302