The ebony swan

3 September 1903 – 8 February 2008

Phyllis Ayame Whitney was born in Yokohama, Japan, the daughter of American parents, and spent her early years in Asia. She began writing early in her teens. In 1918, upon the death of her father, she travelled with her mother to Berkeley, California, and then to San Antonio, Texas. A few years later her mother died, and she moved to Chicago to live with her aunt. After graduating from high school, she began to write seriously, and began to sell her stories to newspapers and pulp magazines while supporting herself by working for The Chicago Public Library and bookstores in Chicago. She married her first husband in 1934. During the 1940s she was a children's book editor for both the Chicago S…