22 Facts About Alma Routsong

Alma Routsong was an American novelist best known for her lesbian fiction, published under the pen name Isabel Miller.

Alma Routsong was born Elma Louise Routsong in Traverse City, Michigan, on November 26,1924.

Alma Routsong's father, Carl Routsong, was a police sergeant, and her mother, Esther Miller Routsong, was a nurse.

Alma Routsong had an older brother Richard and a younger brother Gary.

Alma Routsong was the senior class president and participated in several other organizations including the National Honor Society.

Alma Routsong trained at the Farragut, Idaho, Naval Training Center before working as a hospital apprentice.

Alma Routsong began her literary career in 1953 with the publication of her first novel, A Gradual Joy.

Alma Routsong followed the success of this book with Round Shape in 1959.

In 1969, Alma Routsong self-published A Place for Us under the pseudonym Isabel Miller.

Alma Routsong used her own Bleecker Street Press imprint - named after her shared apartment with Elizabeth Deran on Bleecker Street - after numerous rejections from mainstream publishers.

Alma Routsong based this novel on the 1820s relationship between folk painter Mary Ann Willson and Florence Brundage, and as a result, it was her first explicitly lesbian work.

For each of her subsequent works, Alma Routsong continued to use the name Isabel Miller, a combination of an anagram of "Lesbia" and her mother's maiden name.

Between 1968 and 1971 Alma Routsong worked as an editor at Columbia University.

Alma Routsong joined the gay liberation movement in 1970 and was an officer in the New York chapter of Daughters of Bilitis.

When no one took advantage of it, she and Alma Routsong kissed in front of rolling television cameras.

Alma Routsong married Bruce Brodie in 1947 and they had four daughters; Natalie, Joyce, Charlotte, and Louise.

In 1962, Alma Routsong met Elizabeth Deran at a church event and entered into a romantic relationship with her.

Alma Routsong struggled with alcoholism in the 1970s as her relationship with Deran came to an end.

Alma Routsong developed an interest in spiritualism and enjoyed making astrological charts of the women in her life.

Alma Routsong spent time at Kate Millett's Women's Art Colony Farm.

Later in life, Alma Routsong shared a relationship with artist Julie Weber.

Alma Routsong died of ovarian cancer at age 71 in Poughkeepsie, New York on October 4,1996.