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Katharine Lee Bates
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Katharine Lee Bates
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Katharine Lee Bates
Katharine Lee Bates American poet, author, and educator wrote the text of the national hymn “America the Beautiful” as a poem in 1893 after visiting Pikes Peak in Colorado.

Katharine Lee Bates

American author
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Born:
August 12, 1859, Falmouth, Massachusetts, U.S.
Died:
March 28, 1929, Wellesley, Massachusetts (aged 69)

Katharine Lee Bates (born August 12, 1859, Falmouth, Massachusetts, U.S.—died March 28, 1929, Wellesley, Massachusetts) was a poet, author, and educator who wrote the text of the national hymn “America the Beautiful.”

She was educated at Wellesley College, in Wellesley, Massachusetts, where she taught English literature from 1885 to 1925. Among her many works are The College Beautiful and Other Poems (1887), English Religious Drama (1893), and The Pilgrim Ship (1926). She wrote “America the Beautiful” as a poem titled “America” in 1893. Her book America the Beautiful and Other Poems was published in 1911.

The Editors of Encyclopaedia BritannicaThis article was most recently revised and updated by René Ostberg.