Rose Wilder Lane

Rose Wilder Lane was an American journalist, travel writer, novelist, political theorist and daughter of American writer Laura Ingalls Wilder. Along with two other female writers, Ayn Rand and Isabel Paterson, Lane is noted as one of the most influential advocates of the American libertarian movement.

Lane was the first child of Laura Ingalls Wilder and Almanzo Wilder and the only child of her parents to survive into adulthood. Her early years were a difficult time for her parents because of successive crop failures, illnesses and chronic economic hardships. During her childhood, the family moved several times, living with relatives in Minnesota and then Florida and briefly returning to De Smet, South Dakota before settling in Mansfield, Missouri, in 1894. There, her parents would eventually establish a dairy farm and fruit orchards. She attended secondary school in Mansfield and Crowley, Louisiana while living with her aunt Eliza Jane Wilder, graduating in 1904 in a class of seven. Her intellect and ambition were demonstrated by her ability to compress three years of Latin into one and by graduating at the top of her high school class in Crowley. Despite her academic success, she was unable to attend college as a result of her parents' financial situation.

After high school graduation, Lane returned to her parents' home in Mansfield and learned telegraphy at the Mansfield railroad station. Not satisfied with the options open to young women in Mansfield, by early 1905 she was working for Western Union in Sedalia, Missouri. By 1906, Lane was working as a telegrapher at the Midland Hotel in Kansas City. Over the next five years, Lane worked as a telegrapher in Missouri, Indiana and California.

Lane died in her sleep at age 81 on October 30, 1968 just as she was about to depart on a three-year world tour. She was buried next to her parents at Mansfield Cemetery in Mansfield, Missouri.