Hilda Siller
B&W portrait photo of a woman with her hair in an up-do, wearing a dark jacket.
Portrait from A Woman of the Century
BornAugust 7, 1861
Dubuque, Iowa
DiedOctober 8, 1945(1945-10-08) (aged 84)
Tryon, North Carolina
Pen nameHilda
Occupationwriter
Genre
  • poetry
  • short stories

Hilda Siller (pen name, Hilda; August 7, 1861 – October 8, 1945) was an American poet and short story writer.[1] Although given to the writing of poetry, she was practical in her composition. Siller was also something of a linguist, a musician, and had was said to have "views".[2]

Early life and education

Hilda (or Hulda) Louise Siller was born in Dubuque, Iowa,[1][lower-alpha 1] August 7, 1861.[1] Her father was Frank Siller (1835-1911), of Milwaukee,[4] Wisconsin, who was known as "the German poet" but who emigrated to the U.S. from Saint Petersburg, Russia, when he was a boy of fifteen. Her mother's maiden name was Sarah Ann Baldwin (1834-1884); she was an English woman.[1] Hilda's siblings were: Charles (b. 1863) and Frederick (b. 1875).[3]

She studied music with the best teachers in Europe as well as in Milwaukee, including the works of Frédéric Chopin and Ludwig van Beethoven.[1]

Career

Siller inherited from her parents a love of literature and art. She used the pen name, "Hilda".[4][5] She wrote for Our Continent, later for the Springfield, Massachusetts Republican, Boston Transcript, New York Post, Chicago Inter Ocean, The South, and the St. Louis Globe-Democrat. She wrote regularly for the Wisconsin Weekly,[6] and other Wisconsin papers generally.[1]

The fact that father and daughter were both poets and both possessed conspicuous German traits gave them a sort of unified personality. Both had striking artistic temperaments and the same appreciation of humor, though the latter did not show itself in her poetic writings. On the contrary, the poems of Frank and Hilda Siller were alike distinguished for their pathos. They were widely translated from English into German and extensively copied in German periodicals.[1]

Personal life

Among Siller's characteristics was a noted indifference to "matters matrimonial".[2]

In 1886, she left for Europe for a year.[2]

Hilda Siller died October 8, 1945, in Tryon, North Carolina.[3]

Selected works

Poems

  • "Nothing New" (1884)[7]
  • "An Echo" (1885)[8]
  • "One Soul" (translated from the German of Günther Walling) (1891)[9]
  • "The Boys" (1894)[10]
  • "Imperishable" (1908)[11]

Short stories

  • Her Chief Oddity (1884)[12]
  • "Something About Venice" (1887)[13]
  • "His Name" (1890)[14]

Notes

  1. ↑ Familysearch records Siller's place of birth as Milwaukee, Wisconsin.[3]

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Willard, Frances Elizabeth; Livermore, Mary Ashton Rice (1893). "SILLER, Miss Hilda". A Woman of the Century: Fourteen Hundred-seventy Biographical Sketches Accompanied by Portraits of Leading American Women in All Walks of Life. Charles Wells Moulton. p. 657. Public Domain This article incorporates text from this source, which is in the public domain.
  2. 1 2 3 "More Wisconsin Poets". The Buffalo Times. 29 June 1886. p. 6. Retrieved 12 September 2023 – via Newspapers.com. Public Domain This article incorporates text from this source, which is in the public domain.
  3. 1 2 3 "Hulda Louise Siller Female 7 August 1861 – 8 October 1945". www.familysearch.org. Retrieved 12 September 2023.
  4. 1 2 Cushing, William (1885). Initials and Pseudonyms: A Dictionary of Literary Disguises. T. Y. Crowell & Company. p. 130. Retrieved 12 September 2023. Public Domain This article incorporates text from this source, which is in the public domain.
  5. ↑ Fact, Fancy, and Fable: A New Handbook for Ready Reference on Subjects Commonly Omitted from Cyclopaedias; Comprising Personal Sobriquets, Familiar Phrases, Popular Appellations, Geographical Nicknames, Literary Pseudonyms, Mythological Characters, Red-letter Days, Political Slang, Contractions and Abbreviations, Technical Terms, Foreign Words and Phrases, Americanisms, Etc. Comp. by Henry Frederic Reddall. A.C McClurg. 1892. p. 258. Retrieved 12 September 2023. Public Domain This article incorporates text from this source, which is in the public domain.
  6. ↑ "The Wisconsin Weekly". Baraboo Republic. 17 October 1883. p. 8. Retrieved 12 September 2023 – via Newspapers.com. Public Domain This article incorporates text from this source, which is in the public domain.
  7. ↑ "Nothing New". The Continent. Our Continent Publishing Company. 5: 400. 1884. Retrieved 12 September 2023. Public Domain This article incorporates text from this source, which is in the public domain.
  8. ↑ "An Echo". The Daily Nonpareil. 23 June 1885. p. 3. Retrieved 12 September 2023 – via Newspapers.com. Public Domain This article incorporates text from this source, which is in the public domain.
  9. ↑ "One Soul". The Weekly Wisconsin. 18 April 1891. p. 8. Retrieved 12 September 2023 – via Newspapers.com. Public Domain This article incorporates text from this source, which is in the public domain.
  10. ↑ "The Boys". Asheville Citizen-Times. 29 October 1894. p. 2. Retrieved 12 September 2023 – via Newspapers.com. Public Domain This article incorporates text from this source, which is in the public domain.
  11. ↑ "Imperishable". Fergus County Argus. 27 March 1908. p. A4. Retrieved 12 September 2023 – via Newspapers.com. Public Domain This article incorporates text from this source, which is in the public domain.
  12. ↑ "Her Chief Oddity". Albany Ledger. 7 November 1884. p. 3. Retrieved 12 September 2023 – via Newspapers.com. Public Domain This article incorporates text from this source, which is in the public domain.
  13. ↑ "Something About Venice". The Weekly Wisconsin. 15 October 1887. p. 8. Retrieved 12 September 2023 – via Newspapers.com. Public Domain This article incorporates text from this source, which is in the public domain.
  14. ↑ "His Name". The Weekly Wisconsin. 20 December 1890. p. 10. Retrieved 12 September 2023 – via Newspapers.com. Public Domain This article incorporates text from this source, which is in the public domain.
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