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.