Bokum, Frances Amanda Butcher (1888-1987) (“Fanny”). American newspaper critic and bookstore owner. Born in Fredonia, KS, Butcher moved to Chicago, IL, as a child. She received an A.A. from Lewis Institute in 1908 and a BA from the University of Chicago in 1910. In 1911, Floyd Dell of the Chicago Evening Post assigned her to review Alexander’s Bridge (1912). Cather wrote the anonymous reviewer care of the Post, beginning their correspondence and friendship. From 1913 until her retirement in 1963, Butcher wrote for the Chicago Tribune, becoming literary editor in 1922. She ran Fanny Butcher Books in Chicago from 1919 until 1927, when she sold it to Doubleday. Cather frequently saw Butcher when she changed trains in Chicago and closely followed Butcher’s reviews of her works, often writing to her about them. She also relied on Butcher’s knowledge of the book business and particularly book distribution in the Midwest. Their extant correspondence begins in 1920, although in her memoir Many Lives—One Love (1972), Butcher paraphrases earlier letters. Butcher married Richard Drummond Bokum in 1935.

Knopf, Alfred A. (1892-1984). President of New York publisher Alfred A. Knopf, Inc. Knopf received his BA from Columbia University in New York City in 1912 and founded Alfred Knopf, Inc., in 1915 with his future wife Blanche Wolf. They married in 1916, and their son Alfred “Pat” Knopf was born in 1918. Cather chose him as her publisher beginning with Youth and the Bright Medusa (1920) and One of Ours (1922), partly because she was dissatisfied with the promotion of her books by Houghton Mifflin but also because she recognized the high quality of Knopf's books, as well as what she regarded as his intelligent advertising. Knopf was noted for publishing the work of leading European and South American writers in translation, as well as original works. Knopf and Cather’s extensive correspondence testifies to their mutual professional respect and to what also became an important personal friendship.