click for a larger image of the KAP
House
The Katherine Anne Porter Literary Center located at 508 Center Street in Kyle, Texas was the author's childhood home from 1892-1901.
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click for a larger image of the KAP
House |
Shortly after Kyle was
founded in 1880, Ms. Porter's paternal grandmother built the three-room house
on Center Street after the death of her husband (Katherine Anne Porter's grandfather),
Asbury Porter.
In 1892, Katherine Anne
Porter's father, Harrison, moved into his mother's home with his four children,
following the death of his wife, Mary Alice ( Katherine Anne Porter's mother).
The residence served as the home for the widower and his children until after
the death of Grandma "Cat" in October of 1901.
In April 2000, restoration
of the author's childhood home was completed. Many citizens, the Austin Community
Foundation, the Lower Colorado River Authority, the Clayton Fund, and others
contributed to the purchase of the property.
But it was Bill Johnson and the Burdine Johnson Foundation that funded the historically
correct and extensive renovations and landscape architecture necessary to complete
the project. Texas
State University leases the house as part of a cooperative project between Texas
State and the Hays County Preservation Associates.
The "Angel" Foundation, founded by a nephew of Katherine Anne Porter's childhood friend, Erma Schlemmer, donated the generous gift necessary to fund the operation of the Katherine Anne Porter Literary Center .
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To visit the Katherine
Anne Porter Library at the University of Maryland click here.
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Two small but significant literary archives of Katherine Anne Porter are
held at the Wittliff Collections in the Alkek Library at Texas State
University-San Marcos. For more information click here.
- For an essay about the Katherine Anne Porter House click here.
- For a biography of Katherine Anne Porter click here.