Amy Ruth Kelly, Biographer of Eleanor of Aquitane

An article about Amy R. Kelly appeared in the June 9, 1911 issue of the Sandusky Register. While on faculty at Wellesley College, she and Laura E. Lockwood edited the book, Letters That Live.

Over one hundred fifty letters appeared in the book, representing seventy authors, including Charles Dickens, Lewis Carroll and Emily Dickinson. The New York Times covered the book in its “Review of Books” section on May 7, 1911.

Miss Kelly is best known for her book, Eleanor of Aquitane and the Four Kings, published in 1950 by the Harvard University Press.  It was the first New York Times bestseller for that publisher. Even though it was written over fifty years ago, many maintain that Miss Kelly’s book it is still the best written biography about Eleanor, mother of Richard the Lionhearted; it has been republished multiple times through the 1990s, and remains in print.  While doing research for the book, Amy Kelly made six trips to Europe to retrace Eleanor’s steps. Her research was meticulous. Time Magazine carried an article about the book in an article “The Greatest Frenchwoman” published in June, 1950.

Amy Ruth Kelly was born in Port Clinton, the daughter of Judge Malcolm Kelly. Judge Kelly was a judge of Erie County Common Pleas Court from 1892 to 1897. He also had served in several offices in Ottawa County (including a term as Mayor of Port Clinton), and was held in high esteem by the Bar Association. (He was a grandson of William Kelly, builder of the Marblehead Lighthouse.) Amy’s mother was active in women’s suffrage activities in Erie County; she donated this “Let Ohio Women Vote” poster to the historical collections of the Sandusky Library.

Amy Kelly lived the last years of her life with her sister Elizabeth “Bessie” Kelly  in Miami, Florida, where she died in February of 1962.