Ann Petry (1908 – 1997) was the first American Black woman to produce a book (The Street, 1946) whose sales topped one million. Ultimately, it sold a million and a half copies.

Though a high school teacher encouraged her to write, Ann went to pharmacy college and received a degree. This was in the early 1930s, when a practical profession was a blessing during the Great Depression. She followed in her father’s footsteps to become a pharmacist in the family drugstore.

In 1938, she married George Petry, and the couple moved to Harlem. There she began a writing career in earnest, working as a journalist, columnist, and editor. The Street was published in 1946, and became an overnight sensation. The New York Times called it "a skillfully written and forceful first novel.’’ Its significance was as a novel that explored Black women's experience through the intersection of race, gender, and class.

Ann Petry published seven other books, including children's books, but none was as successful as The Street. She was uncomfortable with fame and returned to Old Saybrook with her husband, raised a daughter, and continued to write, producing several more novels as well as some children's books.

She was quite a cat lover! In the montage below, you'll see an illustration by Bob Eckstein from Inspired by Cats: Writers and their Mews(es), written by yours truly, based on a photo of Ann and her daughter Elizabeth, around 1950.