Seibel, George (1873-1958). American literary and drama critic. Cather met Seibel and his wife Helen while working as editor of the Home Monthly in Pittsburgh in 1896 and 1897. They regularly studied French and German together, Cather read her work in progress to him, and George reviewed April Twilights (1903) in the Pittsburgh Gazette.

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.

Marlowe, Julia (1866-1950). Anglo-American actress. Born Sarah Frost in England, Marlowe made her stage debut in 1878 and first appeared in New York in 1887. Her beauty and refinement made her immensely popular with audiences, and she toured frequently with her own company, co-starring with both her first husband, Robert Taber (married 1894, divorced 1900), and her second, the almost equally well-known actor, E. H. Sothern (married 1911). She was considered a romantic rather than an emotional actress, especially famous in Shakespearean roles. She retired in 1924. Cather, in her early journalism, commented often on Marlowe, whom she considered “dainty” rather than powerful as an actress.

Seibel, Helen Hiller (1873-1971). Cather’s Pittsburgh friend. Born in Pennsylvania to German immigrant parents, Helen Hiller married George Seibel on 6 September 1894. Their one child, Erna, was born in 1897. Cather met the couple through George Seibel’s work for the Home Monthly, which Cather was editing. Soon the three were meeting frequently at the Seibel home, studying and translating French and German literature. Cather read her own poetry and short stories to them as well. The Seibel house at 114 S. 17th Street on Pittsburgh’s South Side served as the model for the home of Alfred Engelhardt and his uncle in “Double Birthday” (1925).

Yorke, Erna Seibel (1897-after 1971). Daughter of Cather’s friends, George and Helen Seibel. Erna Seibel was born in Pittsburgh, PA; Willa Cather was a frequent visitor at her family’s home in her early childhood. She attended Carnegie Tech, studying art. Around 1927 she married Cecil B. Yorke, a writer. They had a son, Duane, and lived in New York in the 1930s, later moving to Santa Cruz, CA. She donated the letters Cather had written to her parents to the Cather Foundation.