Westermann, Fritz (1865-1934). American attorney. Born in Illinois to Louis and Emma Tyndale Westermann, Fritz and his twin brother Max came to Lincoln, NE, in 1885, where he worked first as a bookkeeper and then as an attorney from 1890 to 1893, when he apparently left Lincoln. He and his brothers bought the Lincoln Evening News in the early 1890s, hiring Cather to report on the Crete Chautauqua in 1894. Around 1913 Fritz returned to Lincoln, selling real estate before he joined the city treasurer’s office where he worked until 1929. He died in Miami, FL. Cather portrayed the Westermann family as the Ehrlich family in One of Ours (1922). In 1898 she reacted strongly to news of Fritz’s enlistment as a private in the 2nd Nebraska Infantry during the Spanish-American War in 1898. Before the publication of “Double Birthday” (1928), she sent Fritz a copy to see if he objected to her portrayal of his uncle Dr. Julius Tyndale as Uncle Albert Engelhardt and was pleased by his approval.

Fisher, Dorothy Canfield (1879-1958). American novelist; educational and social reformer. Dorothy Canfield and Willa Cather became friends in 1891 at the University of Nebraska in Lincoln, where Canfield's father, James Canfield, had come to serve as Chancellor. The family moved to Columbus, OH, in 1895 when James Canfield assumed the presidency of Ohio State University, from which Dorothy graduated in 1899. She then followed her father to New York City, where he became Librarian of Columbia University, and she pursued graduate study in Romance Languages at the University of Paris and Columbia, from which she earned a PhD in 1904. On Cather’s first trip to Europe, she spent time in France and England with Canfield, including an awkward visit to the home of poet A.E. Housman. Cather derived the central character of “The Profile” (1907) from Canfield’s friend Evelyn Osborne, whom Cather had met in Europe. Cather and Canfield became estranged for more than a decade because Canfield objected to the story’s planned inclusion in The Troll Garden (1905). Canfield married John Redwood Fisher in 1907, and their primary residence was Arlington, VT. Canfield Fisher had spent 1916-1918 in France engaging in war relief work, and Cather’s consultation with her about the accuracy of her depiction of wartime France in One of Ours (1922) led them to reconcile. In 1925 Canfield Fisher became a founding member of the Book of the Month Club selection committee. She published her novels (most of them very popular) under the name Dorothy Canfield but her various nonfiction works as Dorothy Canfield Fisher.

Canfield, Eli Hawley (1817-1898). American minister; Dorothy Canfield Fisher’s grandfather. Born in Arlington, VT, Eli Canfield left school at age seventeen to teach. He enrolled in the Alexandria (VA) Theological Seminary in 1841. Ordained in 1844, he served as an Episcopal minister in Ohio for five years. He married Martha Hulme of New Jersey in 1846; their son James Hulme Canfield was born in 1847. Eli Canfield then served churches in New York City and Brooklyn, NY, before retiring to serve as an interim minister for various congregations. He suffered a stroke in 1887 and became partially paralyzed in 1890. He died June 3, 1898. Willa Cather, a friend of the Canfield family, noted the effect of Eli Canfield’s death on his granddaughter, her friend Dorothy Canfield.

Wellman, Walter (1858-1934). American journalist, Arctic explorer. Born in Ohio, Walter Wellman moved with his family to York County, NE, where at age fourteen he started a newspaper. In 1879 he moved back to Ohio, where he worked as a journalist; in 1884 he became a political correspondent for the Chicago Herald. Interested in the search for the North Pole, he mounted his first expedition in 1894. The National Geographical Society sponsored his second expedition in 1898, which succeeded in mapping some of Franz Josef Land on the Arctic Circle but did not get any nearer the Pole. In 1907 and 1909 his attempts to reach the North Pole by airship failed. Willa Cather’s cousin, Dr. James Howard Gore, was involved with the 1898 Wellman expedition.

Schenfeldt, Otto. Tutor. Willa Cather met a man named Otto Schenfeldt in Washington, DC, in 1898. She identified him as a tutor to the sons of Signore de Louie and as an ardent supporter of the Spanish cause (#0049).

Gore, Lillian Sparrendahl (1866-1913). Wife of James Howard Gore. Born and raised in Sweden, Lillian married James Howard Gore in 1889, coming to live with him in Washington, DC, where he was a professor at Columbian University. They had one daughter, Sidney, who died at age fifteen. Cather stayed with the Gores for a time in 1901, and admired her cousin’s wife; however, Cather’s claims about Lillian’s early life have not been verified.

Grieg, Edvard (1847-1907). Norwegian composer. Born in Bergen, Norway, Grieg began his musical studies with his mother; a family friend, famed violinist Ole Bull, recommended that he study in Leipzig. He made his debut as a pianist in 1861, and also began composing, making use of Norwegian folk music. One of his most famous compositions is the incidental music he composed for Henrik Ibsen’s play Peer Gynt (1876). Grieg traveled widely and was internationally praised, but he maintained his home near Bergen, where he died. Cather mentioned Grieg’s songs in her letters, and Thea Kronborg sings one in The Song of the Lark (1915).

Gere, Charles Henry (1838-1904). Newspaper publisher; Cather's employer during college. Charles H. Gere, born in New York, graduated from Dickinson College in Carlisle, PA, in 1861 and joined the Union army. In 1865 he moved to Nebraska, where his family had moved. Politically active in the Republican Party, he moved to Lincoln, NE, and founded the city’s first newspaper, the Nebraska State Journal. He married Mariel E. Clapham of Washington, D.C., in 1871. While serving as a representative in the first state legislature, he helped found the University of Nebraska, for which he served as regent from 1882 to 1892. Cather wrote for his newspaper when she was a university student, and became a friend of Charles and Mariel Gere’s three daughters, Mariel, Ellen, and Frances. She remembered Charles Gere’s “kindness, his easy wit, the ease and charm of his personality.”

Gere, Mariel E. Clapham (1838-1912). Cather’s friend; mother of her friends, the Gere sisters. Mariel Elizabeth Clapham was born in Washington, D.C., the daughter of Captain John Clapham and Mariel Goodwin Clapham. She corresponded with Charles Gere for several years before their marriage in 1871, when she came to Lincoln, NE. When Cather became friends with their daughters Mariel, Ellen, and Frances, she welcomed her to their home at 8th and D streets. Mrs. Gere, according to Cather, persuaded her to grow out her close-cropped hair.

Gere, Mariel Clapham (1874-1960). Cather’s university friend; a teacher. Mariel Gere, eldest daughter of Charles H. and Mariel C. Gere, born in Lincoln, NE, entered the University of Nebraska's prep school in the same year Cather did. She and her sisters visited Cather several times in Red Cloud, NE. Both were members of the Union Literary Society until Gere joined the Kappa Kappa Gamma sorority in 1892. Gere graduated in the science course and taught chemistry at Lincoln High until 1941. She also served on the Lincoln City Library board for many years. Cather and Gere remained friends and correspondents; Gere defended Cather from accusations that she had been arrogant and friendless during her university years.

Gere, Ellen Bladen (1875-1941) (“Ned” or “Neddums”). Cather's friend. Ellen Gere, the second daughter of Charles H. and Mariel C. Gere, was born in Lincoln, NE. She visited Cather in Red Cloud, NE, with her sisters, and Cather included her in her correspondence in the 1890s. Ellen Gere entered the University of Nebraska in Lincoln around 1892, but graduated with the class of 1899. In the 1920s she adopted two children, believing, with her friend Dorothy Canfield, that women who wanted to be mothers did not have to be married.