Helen Churchill Candee

Helen Churchill Candee
Helen Churchill Candee in 1901
Born	(1858-10-05)October 5, 1858 New York City
Died	August 23, 1949(1949-08-23) (aged 90) York Harbor, Maine

Helen Churchill Candee (October 5, 1858 – August 23, 1949) was an American author, journalist, interior decorator, feminist, and geographer. Today, she is best known as a survivor of the sinking of RMS Titanic in 1912, and for her later work as a travel writer and explorer of southeast Asia.

Helen was born Helen Churchill Hungerford, the daughter of New York City merchant Henry Hungerford and his wife Mary Churchill. She spent most of her childhood in Connecticut. She married Edward Candee of Norwalk, Connecticut and had two children by him, Edith and Harold. After her abusive husband abandoned the family, Helen Candee supported herself and children as a writer for popular magazines such as Scribner's and The Ladies' Home Journal. She initially wrote on the subjects most familiar to her—genteel etiquette and household management—but soon branched into other topics such as child care, education, and women's rights. For several years she resided in Oklahoma, and her stories about that region helped to catapult her to national prominence as a journalist. Candee obtained a divorce in 1896, after a lengthy separation.

Candee was a feminist, as evidenced by her best-selling first book, How Women May Earn a Living (1900). Her second book, An Oklahoma Romance (1901), was a novel that promoted the possibilities of settlement in Oklahoma Territory.

An established literary figure, Candee moved to Washington, D.C., where she became one of the first professional interior decorators. Her clients included then Secretary of War Henry Stimson and President Theodore Roosevelt. Candee's book, Decorative Styles and Periods (1906), embodied her principles of design: careful historical research and absolute authenticity.