Ann Sophia (Winterbotham) Stephens (30 March 1813-20 August 1886), prolific writer of serial fiction, is remembered today as the author of Malaeska, which became the first Beadle Dime Novel. Born in Humphreysville, Connecticut, the daughter of Ann and John Winterbotham, manager of Humphreys' woolen mills, she lost her mother early and was brought up by her mother's sister, who became her stepmother. Educated in a local dame school and in South Britain, Connecticut, she was influenced during her formative years by the poet-patriot Colonel David Humphreys, playwright and friend of the Hartford wits. As she later put it, "Long before I knew what authorship was, I had made up my mind to write stories and make books." It was said that she exercised her ambition by couching her complaints about the neighbors in verse and dropping the results on their porches.

In 1831 she married Edward Stephens of Plymouth, Massachusetts, a...