Cid Ricketts Sumner

Cid Ricketts Sumner (27 SEPT 1890 – 15 OCT 1970) USA Author

Cid Ricketts Sumner's was born Bertha Louise Ricketts in Brookhaven, Mississippi. She was the daughter of Bertha Burnley and Robert Scott Ricketts. Her father was a professor at Millsaps College and her mother and grandmother homeschooled her. She received a BS from Millsaps College in 1909 and an MA from Columbia University in 1910. She continued postgrad work at Columbia between 1910–1914 before enrolling in medical school at Cornell. She only attended one year of medical school before marrying one of her professors, Nobel Prize winner James B. Sumner, on July 10, 1915. They had 4 children (although the Nobel website for James B. Sumner indicated that they had SIX children, one of whom died young.) They were divorced in 1930.

In addition to being a writer, Mrs. Sumner taught English at Jackson High School and French at Millsaps College.

Several of Mrs. Sumner's books were filmed. The most well-known were QUALITY, which became the movie PINKY; TAMMY OUT OF TIME became the movie TAMMY AND THE BACHELOR; and TAMMY TELL ME TRUE. QUALITY was quite ahead of its time in terms of dealing miscegenation. It involves a young fair-skinned black woman who goes to nursing school in the north and passes for white.

Mrs. Sumner sadly died a very violent death at the age of 80 in Duxbury, Massachusetts. Her grandson, John R. Cutler, was charged with her murder.