Mary Roberts Rinehart

Mary Roberts Rinehart (August 12, 1876 – September 22, 1958) was an American writer, often called the American Agatha Christie. Rinehart published her first mystery novel, The Circular Staircase, in 1908, which introduced the "had I but known" narrative style. Rinehart is also considered the earliest known source of the phrase "the butler did it", in her novel The Door (1930), although the exact phrase does not appear in her work and the plot device had been used prior to that time. She also worked to tell the stories and experiences of front line soldiers during World War I, one of the first women to travel to the Belgian front lines.

Biography

Rinehart was born Mary Ella Roberts in Allegheny City, Pennsylvania, now a part of Pittsburgh. A sister, Olive Louise, four years Mary's junior, would later gain recognition as an author of children's books and as a nationally syndicated newspaper columnist. Her father was a frustrated inventor, and throughout her childhood, the family often had financial problems. Her father committed suicide when Mary was 19 years old. Tending to be left-handed at a time when that was considered disadvantageous, she was trained to use her right hand instead.

She attended public schools and graduated at age 16, then enrolled at the Pittsburgh Training School for Nurses at Pittsburgh Homeopathic Hospital, where she graduated in 1897.