With March being Women’s History month, the city of Jackson, Mississippi should take a closer look into their very own inspirational women; one of those women being Eudora Welty. 

Eudora Welty, winner of the Pulitzer Prize in fiction in 1973, is widely known as a novelist and short story writer. Welty was born in Jackson, Mississippi in 1909 and studied at the Mississippi State University for Women. She eventually went on to transfer schools to the Midwest, coming back to Jackson Mississippi once she was trying to get published. “People gather at Eudora Welty’s house because they have read her work and want to learn more about her as a person. They love to see the work of a great author”, says Laura Rhodes, coordinator at Eudora Welty House. The mission of the Eudora Welty house is to inspired creativity, “by having her legacy in the house, people are able to see what she did and hopefully be inspired to create their own works of art”. Eudora Welty was not exactly an activist for women, but she did let people know the struggles she faced as a woman author in the south. “She faced a lot of gender inequality when she was trying to find her own home because no one wanted to sale land to a woman” says Mary Katherine,Event Coordinator at Eudora Welty House. 

Welty first worked for newspapers, a radio station, and she also worked for the Works Progress Administration during the Great Depression. Welty now ranks as one of the most significant woman writers of the twentieth century according to WomenOfTheHall.org. Her work not only teaches us about ourselves and the human spirit, but she also helped put womeninto focus with their views of themselves and the men that surround them. “In her autobiography, she wrote a little about the backlash she faced from many people because she was a woman trying to make it as an author, it was not as hard for her as you think because once her name was out there that was it” says Mary Katherine. During Welty’s life, gender equality was still something that was fought over, even today there is still undeniable inequality; did she face the pay difference of genders? “She did not, being an author is good for that reason, there is no inequality there because your revenue is based off of the books the author is selling and she sold many, people loved her work” Mary Katherine says. 

Every year, Mississippi State University for women and the University Press of Mississippi collaborate to award the Welty Prize for a book of scholarship on women’s studies, southern stories, or modern letters. Prize winning manuscripts have often combined all three of those areas and won scholarships. “This award makes me very proud and it made her proud too, she loved that scholarship and she had a large input on the students that received it”, says Mary Katherine. With the fame that Welty carried once she became published, it would be easy to become an activist for an issue as large as gender equality, “She was more temperament than activist in her life, she did become a focus for other activists’ in her autobiographical memoir” says Mary Katherine. In Welty’s memoir One Writer’s Beginnings,she acknowledges the privilege she had, “Indeed, my parents could not give me books enough. They must have sacrificed to give to me on my sixth and seventh birthday” (3). 

Eudora Welty is now in the Women’s Hall of Fame for her writing and her resilience in gender inequality. She was not an activist, but she made it subtlety known in her writing that gender inequality was a problem. She lived a long life, passing in July 2001, but her legacy lives on through her home and her writing. Her inspiration is passed down through the generous scholarships and awards that are set in her name. As women’s History month comes to an end, take a look around you to see the inspirational, extra-ordinary women in your life. Women all over the world are resilient and outstanding, let’s stand up and show the world who we are.

Mary Katherine Graves 601-353-7762 or email tours@eudoraweltyhouse.com

Laura Rhodes 601-353-7762