Woman of the Century/Laura C. Redden Searing

SEARING, Mrs. Laura Catherine Redden, author, born in Somerset county, Md., 9th LAURA CATHERINE REDDEN SEARING. February, 1840 Her maiden name was Laura Catherine Redden. She was made deaf, when ten years of age, by a severe attack of cerebro-spinal meningitis. She lost the power of speech with hearing, but she retained her memory of sounds and her understanding of rhythm She began in youth to write verses and contributed both in verse and prose to the press. She was irregularly educated. Her parents removed to St. Louis, Mo., where she attended the State institution for the deaf and dumb. In 1860 she adopted the pen-name "Howard Glyndon" and became a regular writer on the St. Louis "Republican." That journal sent her to Washington, D. C, as a correspondent during the Civil war. In 1865 she went to Europe, where she remained until 1868. perfecting herself in German, French, Spanish and Italian. During her stay in Europe she was a regular correspondent of the New York "Times." Returning to New York City in 1868, she joined the staff of the " Mail," on which she remained until 1876, when she became the wife of Edward W. Searing, a lawyer. During her eight years of service on the "Mail" she studied articulation with Alexander Graham Bell and other teachers, and learned to speak easily and naturally. In 1886 her health failed, and she and her husband removed to California, where she now lives. In addition to her voluminous newspaper and magazine work, she has published "Notable Men of the Thirty-Seventh Congress," a pamphlet (1862); "Idyls of Battle, and Poems of the Rebellion" (1864); "A Little Boy's Story," translated from the French (1869), and "Sounds from Secret Chambers" (1874).