1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Allen, James Lane

ALLEN, JAMES LANE (1850–  ), American novelist, was born near Lexington, Kentucky, on the 21st of December 1850. He graduated at Kentucky University, Lexington, in 1872, taught at Fort Spring, Kentucky, at Richmond and at Lexington, Missouri, and from 1877 to 1879 at the academy of Kentucky University, where he was principal and taught modern languages; in 1880 he was professor of Latin and English at Bethany College, Bethany, West Virginia; and then became head of a private school at Lexington, Kentucky. Subsequently he gave up teaching, went to New York City, where he secured commissions for sketches of the Blue Grass region, and thereafter devoted himself to literature. His Choir Invisible, coming after other successful stories, made his name well known in England as well as America. His published works include: With Flute and Violin (1891), The Blue Grass Region (1892), John Gray (1893), A Kentucky Cardinal (1894), Aftermath (1895), A Summer in Arcady (1896), The Choir Invisible (1897), The Reign of Law (1900), The Mettle of the Pasture (1903), and The Bride of the Mistletoe (1909.)