Hope Hale Davis

Hope Hale Davis (November 2, 1903 – October 2, 2004) was a 20th-Century American feminist (or "proto-feminist") and communist, later author and writing teacher.

Davis was born Frances Hope Hale on November 2, 1903 in Iowa City, Iowa, the fifth and youngest child of Hal Hale, a school superintendent, and Frances McFarland, a teacher. Her father died young, and her mother remarried to John Overholt. When her stepfather died, too, mother and daughter moved to Washington, D.C.

There, young Hope Hale studied at the new Corcoran School of Art and George Washington University, as well as Cincinnati University and the Portland School of Art. She did not obtain a college degree.

In 1924, Davis become assistant to the Stuart Walker Repertory Company's art director, for whom she painted scenery and designed costumes.

In 1926, she moved to New York City, where she worked in advertising as a secretary at the Frank Presbrey Agency. There, she wrote copy and sold drawings. She left to become a freelance writer, publishing stories in magazines such as Collier's, The New Yorker, and Bookman. In 1929, she became promotion manager for Life magazine. In 1931, she founded and edited Love Mirror, a women's pulp magazine.

In February 1933, after marrying a second husband, with whom she had a daughter, she moved to Washington, D.C. There, she worked on the Consumers' Counsel of the Agricultural Adjustment Administration (AAA) under Frederic C. Howe. Her husband, German economist Karl Brunck worked for the National Recovery Administration.

She also joined the Soviet spy ring called the "Ware Group," as recounted later in her memoir. In 1934, one group meeting included J. Peters, Lee Pressman, Marion Bachrach, and John Abt. Other members included: Harold Ware, Charles Kramer, Alger Hiss, Nathaniel Weyl, Laurence Duggan, Harry Dexter White, Abraham George Silverman, Nathan Witt, Julian Wadleigh, Henry Collins, and Victor Perlo.

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