Elizabeth Miller

Elizabeth ("Bessie") Jane Miller aka Elizabeth Miller (August 17, 1878 – August 19, 1961) was born on a farm in Montgomery County, Indiana, near New Ross, to parents Timothy and Samantha (West) Miller. She wrote best-selling novels during the same era as fellow Hoosiers Lew Wallace, Maurice Thompson, Booth Tarkington, Charles Major, Meredith Nicholson, and George Barr McCutcheon. Her first three novels, a trilogy, set forth the rise, triumph and decline of Judaism, and placed Miller near the top among the list of writers of modern classics of her day, her strength lying in her ability to produce “atmosphere” and in reproducing scenes of the Orient.

In her first three novels, a trilogy, Miller dealt with Far Eastern themes and the early days of Christianity. In 1901, without previous experience in novel-writing, she began The Yoke, a story of the Exodus. As an exceedingly young and hitherto unknown writer, her novel was subjected to the closest scrutiny before it was finally published with the commendation of 1,500 prominent ministers, educators, professionals, and literary editors of the U.S. The same year, Miller entered into a contract for Saul of Tarsus, and less than two years after its publication, her third novel, The City of Delight was issued, being a Biblical novel about a Jewish maiden and her lover.

Miller's later publications included, Daybreak, a Story of the Age of Discovery (1915) and The Science of Christopher Columbus (1923). Some of her papers and letters are held by Indiana University.

On June 16, 1908, she married Oren S. Hack (d. 1942), an Indianapolis attorney. A few years after marriage, they moved from Indianapolis to the 174 acres (70 ha) Hack farm, Hackshill, in Boggstown, Indiana. They had five children, Virginia, John, Stephen, Joseph, and Eleanor. By 1960, she had returned to Indianapolis to live with her daughter, Eleanor, but continued running the Hack farm. She passed away on August 19, 1961. -- bio adapted from Wikipedia