Frederick Manfred
Frederick Manfred, originally born Frederick Feikema on January 6, 1912, in Iowa, was a notable American author recognized for his contributions to regional and Western literature. After completing his education at Calvin College, he embarked on a diverse career that included work as a sports writer and a political campaign assistant, as well as writing fiction. Manfred published over two dozen novels, volumes of stories, poetry collections, and a memoir throughout his career. His writing often drew from autobiographical experiences and was set in the Siouxland region, featuring works like "Green Earth," which was acclaimed for its portrayal of rural life. He was also known for his Buckskin Man Tales, including the best-selling "Lord Grizzly," a fictionalized biography of mountain man Hugh Glass. Despite facing criticism for his handling of complex themes such as sexuality, he explored diverse narratives, including those of the Sioux Indians. Manfred's literary achievements earned him several fellowships and the Mark Twain Award, situating him alongside notable regional novelists like Thomas Wolfe and O. E. Rølvaag. He passed away on September 9, 1994, in Minnesota, leaving behind a legacy of rich storytelling that reflects the intricacies of American life.
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Frederick Manfred
Writer
- Born: January 6, 1912
- Birthplace: Near Doon, Iowa
- Died: September 9, 1994
- Place of death: Luverne, Minnesota
Biography
Frederick Feikema (who changed his surname legally to Manfred later in life) was born January 6, 1912, on a farm near Doon in northwestern Iowa, the first of six sons of farmer and carpenter Feike Feikes Feikema VI and Aaltje (née von Engen) Feikema. He attended Doon Christian School and Hull Academy in Hull, Iowa, after which he worked two years on the family farm. He went on to enroll in Calvin College in Grand Rapids, Michigan, earning a bachelor of arts degree in English in 1934. Manfred married Maryanna Shorba on October 31, 1942, and the couple had three children. They divorced in October, 1978.
During the mid-1930’s, Manfred hitchhiked across the United States, supporting himself largely as a manual laborer. He worked as a sports writer for the Minneapolis Journal from 1937 to 1939, but contracted tuberculosis and entered Glen Lake Sanitarium in Oak Terrace, Minnesota, for two years. After his recovery he edited the magazine Modern Medicine from 1942 to 1943, leaving to become the assistant manager of Hubert Humphrey’s campaign for mayor of Minneapolis. Besides publishing fiction, Manfred was a writer-in-residence at Macalester College in St. Paul, Minnesota, from 1949 to 1951, and at the University of South Dakota in Vermillion from 1968 to 1983. He was also a consultant in the humanities at Augustana College in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, from 1984 to 1994. He died of lymphoma on September 9, 1994, in Luverne, Minnesota.
Manfred wrote poetry in college and helped edit The Calvin College Chimes. By the time his first novel, The Golden Bowl, was published in St. Paul in 1944, he had rewritten it six times. Thanks to the help of famed novelist Sinclair Lewis, however, Manfred was soon able to move on to a nationally prominent publisher. He eventually wrote more than two dozen novels and volumes of stories, as well as two collections of poetry and a memoir.
Many of his novels were autobiographical and were set in the region he called Siouxland, the Big Sioux River Valley of Iowa, Minnesota, Nebraska, and South Dakota. His best novel in this vein, and in the opinion of many the best he ever wrote, was Green Earth, a long chronicle of rural life in the opening decades of the twentieth century. Manfred set many of his later works, his Buckskin Man Tales, in the American West. These novels proved to be his most popular, and included Lord Grizzly, his best-selling fictionalized biography of mountain man Hugh Glass. Although criticized for his sometimes awkward treatment of sexuality, in The Manly Hearted Woman he wrote a complex tale of sexual identity among the Sioux Indians.
Manfred earned a number of fellowships during his career, as well as the Mark Twain Award from the Society for the Study of Midwestern Literature in 1981. He was frequently compared to Thomas Wolfe and O. E. Rølvaag, two other regional novelists whose works transcend their time and place.