Burnett, Frances Hodgson (1849-1924), was an English-born author best known for her children’s novels Little Lord Fauntleroy (1886) and The Secret Garden (1911). Little Lord Fauntleroy tells a “rags to riches” story about an American boy who is found by his rich English grandfather and placed in a position of wealth. Fauntleroy wears long curls and a velvet suit with lace cuffs and collar. The outfit became a popular fashion for boys in the late 1800’s. The Secret Garden tells about an orphaned girl who blossoms as she tends an abandoned garden on her uncle’s estate in England.
Frances Eliza Hodgson was born on Nov. 24, 1849, in Manchester, England. In 1865, she moved with her family to Knoxville, Tennessee. She married Swan Burnett, a Knoxville doctor, in 1873. She dramatized Little Lord Fauntleroy and a short novel Sara Crewe (1888) as A Little Princess. Burnett wrote other children’s novels as well as adult fiction. She died on Oct. 29, 1924.
See also Secret Garden, The.
