Kate Chopin was born Katherine O’Flaherty, and was of Irish and French descent. While her tombstone reads that she was born in 1851, Kate Chopin’s baptismal certificate states that she was born February 8^th, 1850. The Library of Congress did not accept the corrected date until September, 2009. Her father died when she was only 5, and she was raised by her mother, her grandmother, and her great-grandmother. She grew up bilingual and had an interest in music as well as literature. She married Oscar Chopin in 1870 and they had 6 children. Unfortunately, Oscar Chopin died just 12 years later of malaria, leaving Kate to raise the 6 children and run his general store. In 1885, her mother died. Due to the lost of her husband and mother, Chopin fell into a depression, and it was recommended by her obstetrician that she take up writing as it was considered therapeutic. In 1889, she began publishing short stories, and her first novel, The Fault, was published privately in 1890. What is now considered her greatest work, The Awakening, was published in 1899 and most critics gave it negative reviews. In 1904, Chopin was attending the St. Louis World’s Fair and suffered from a brain hemorrhage. She died two days later on August 22, 1904. In 1990, Kate Chopin was posthumously awarded with a star on the St. Louis Walk of Fame, and she received a bronze bust at the Writer’s Corner in St. Louis, in 2012.