Grace Stone Coates

Grace Stone Coates
A photo of Coates provided to Falcon Publishing for the biography, Honey Wine & Hunger Root, written in 1985 by Lee Rostad

Grace Stone Coates (1881–1976) wrote short stories, poetry, and news articles. She did most of her writing out of her home in Martinsdale, Montana. Coates published her first poem, "The Intruder," in 1921 and her first series of linked stories, Black Cherries, in 1931. She co-edited and wrote for Frontier, a literary magazine edited by Harold G. Merriam, a creative writing professor at the University of Montana.

On May 20, 1881, Grace Genevieve Stone was born on a wheat farm in Kansas to Heinrich and Olive Stone. She was the youngest of four children. Grace and her older sister, Helen, were born to Heinrich and Olive. The two older children were born to Heinrich and his first wife. Heinrich had a rich classical background; he taught Greek in Berlin before coming to the United States. He channeled his love of the classics into his interactions with Grace, recited poetry to her, took her on long walks to learn the names of plants and trees, and read her mythology until she could recite it from memory. Her poetry was greatly influenced by her childhood and by her father.

Her family moved to Wisconsin when she was in high school, where she attended Oshkosh State Normal School. Coates also attended the University of Chicago, the University of Southern California and the University of Hawaii. She never finished a degree, but received her teaching certificate in 1900.

Grace moved to Stevensville, Montana, to be closer to her sister Helen, and started teaching. She later moved to Butte, where she met her future husband, Henderson Coates. The two married in 1910 and moved to Martinsdale, where her husband opened a general store with his brother. Grace taught in Martinsdale from 1914–1919 and was the Meagher County Superintendent from 1918-1921. This is where she started writing. Her first poem, "The Intruder," was published in Poetry, a Magazine of Verse.