moves with the children to Sullivan, Indiana.
1882
In February, TD’s eldest brother, successful songwriter
and entertainer Paul Dresser (who had Americanized the
spelling of the family name), visits the impoverished clan in
Sullivan. That spring, Paul establishes them in a furnished
cottage in Evansville, Indiana, where he lives with girlfriend
Sallie Walker (immortalized in his song, “My Gal Sal”).
1884
In the summer, Sarah and children move to Chicago, where
her three eldest daughters were living. One of them, Mame,
is involved with a prominent man twenty years her senior.
In the fall, unable to meet Chicago expenses, Sarah and the
three youngest move to Warsaw, Indiana, where TD enjoys
his first public school experience.
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1886
Family learns that sister Emma, who had moved back to
Chicago, has run off with L. A. Hopkins, the married
cashier of a Chicago bar from which he stole $3,500.
They elope to Montreal, and settle in New York. (Their
adventures would provide key plot elements for Sister
Carrie.) Several months later, sister Sylvia announces she is
pregnant by the son of a wealthy Warsaw family; the man
refuses to marry her. TD and other young siblings feel
ostracized and embarrassed.
1887
TD’s wastrel older brother Rome joins the family in
Warsaw, followed by his unemployed and ailing father and
two older sisters. In the summer, TD borrows six dollars
from his mother and moves alone to Chicago, where he
would work at odd jobs. The Warsaw contingent (including
Sylvia’s illegitimate baby) later joins TD in Chicago.
1889–90
A Warsaw teacher, Mildred Fielding, arranges for TD, who
had only completed one year of high school, to attend
Indiana University, paying his living expenses. After one
year in Bloomington, TD returns to Chicago.
1890
In November, Sarah Dreiser, aged fifty-seven, dies while
TD holds her in his arms.
1891
In summer, the bereaved father is unable to assume family
leadership, and the Dreiser family splits up again.
1891
After losing a job for petty theft, TD lands his first
newspaper job, with the Chicago Globe Herald – not
writing, but handing out Christmas gifts to the poor.
1892
TD begins writing political news and then Sunday features
for the Chicago Globe. In November, he begins reporting
for the St. Louis Globe-Democrat; later he is assigned a
daily column, “Heard in the Corridors.” After scooping a
railroad disaster, TD receives a promotion to drama critic.
1893
In April, after he is caught making up reviews of plays that
did not appear, TD slinks off to the St. Louis Republic,
writing feature stories. In the summer, TD is selected by the
Republic to accompany a group of twenty schoolteachers
to the Chicago World’s Fair. Among them is Sara Osborne
White (aka “Sallie” and “Jug”), whom he will later
marry.
1894
In March, TD moves to Grand Rapids, Ohio, to assist a
friend taking over a local paper. Finding the work banal,
TD quickly moves on to Toledo, where he hits it off with
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Blade city editor, Arthur Henry. Henry offers TD work
reporting local street-car strike. When few other
assignments are forthcoming, TD moves on to Cleveland,
Buffalo, and then Pittsburgh, securing a position on
Pittsburgh Dispatch.
1894
In July, TD visits Sara White at her family home in
Montgomery City, Missouri. Then he visits brother Paul in
New York, where he also sees sister Emma. In November,
with $240 in savings, TD moves to New York. After
rebuffs from various newspapers, TD is hired as space-rate
reporter for the New York World.
1895
TD tries unsuccessfully to write articles and stories. He is
hired by Howley, Haviland, and Company (a music
production firm in which Paul is involved) to edit a
monthly magazine to sell their music, Ev’ry Month, which
debuts in October. TD writes much of the contents until
quitting in the summer of 1897.
1897
TD collaborates with Paul in writing the popular ballad,
“On the Banks of the Wabash.”
1897–1900
TD writes freelance journalism for magazines such as
Success, Metropolitan, Cosmopolitan, Munsey’s, and Ainslee’s.
1898
On 28 December, TD marries Sara; the couple take an
apartment in New York.
1899
In July, the Dreisers visit Arthur Henry and his wife, Maud,
in Maumee, Ohio. With Henry’s encouragement, TD
completes “McEwen of the Shining Slave Makers,” the
first of several short stories he will publish in the next two
years (others include “Nigger Jeff” and “Old Rogaum and
his Theresa”). When the Dreisers return to New York in
September, Henry accompanies them. With Henry and
Sara’s encouragement, TD begins Sister Carrie.
1900
After Sara and Henry edit Sister Carrie, TD submits it to
Harper and Brothers, which rejects it. At Doubleday, Page
and Company, the manuscript is enthusiastically supported
by Frank Norris. Page agrees to publish it, but Doubleday
fears it will not sell. The firm tries to pull out of the
agreement, but TD fights to have it published. Due to
Norris’s efforts, Sister Carrie was widely but tepidly
reviewed. Doubleday refuses to publicize it, and the novel
fades from view. TD would later claim that the
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“suppression” of Sister Carrie precipitated his neurasthenia
(nervous breakdown) that lasted nearly three years.
1900
On Christmas day, TD’s 79-year-old father dies,
exacerbating his son’s depression.
1901
Sister Carrie is published in England (by William
Heinemann), to better reviews. TD works on two novels,
“The Rake” (never published) and Jennie Gerhardt,
completing forty chapters by the spring. He writes articles
on the side.
1901
In summer, TD quarrels with Henry during visit to
Dumpling Island, on Connecticut coast. Henry’s negative
account of TD’s behavior appears the following year in An
Island Cabin, further alienating the men.
1901
In the fall, TD secures a contract to publish The
Transgressor ( Jennie Gerhardt) with J. F. Taylor, but
remains depressed over its slow progress.
1902
The Dreisers travel through the South. By January, TD’s
depression has progressed to physical symptoms, including
chest pains and headaches. By the summer, he has shelved
Jennie Gerhardt.
1903
Destitute, TD sends Sara home to live with her family. At
Paul’s urging, TD enrolls in a six-week treatment program
in the Olympia Sanitarium in Westchester County. In June,
TD acquires a job as a manual laborer for New York
Central Railroad, working on Hudson River and living in
Kingsbridge, New York.
1904–06
Largely recovered, TD resumes writing and editing,
including working on an autobiography of his breakdown
period (posthumously published as An Amateur Laborer),
joining staff of New York Daily News, and editing Smith’s
Magazine and Broadway Magazine.
1906
In January, brother Paul dies of a heart attack.
1907
Sister Carrie gains a second life when reissued by B. W.
Dodge and Company (with TD as a major investor), to
better reviews.
1907
TD becomes editor-in-chief of the Delineator, an organ of
the Butterick Publishing Company, which produces
women’s magazines. TD makes $5,000 annual salary and
helps boost circulation considerably.
1908
TD meets H. L. Mencken, who writes some pieces for
Delineator.
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1909
TD meets, and soon falls in love with, seventeen-year-old
Thelma Cudlipp, daughter of a Butterick co-worker.
1910
In the fall, Annie Ericsson Cudlipp tells TD’s bosses of his
interest in her daughter and threatens to go to the
newspapers. TD is fired in October; he also leaves Sara.
Although TD gives October 1910 as the date of his
separation, he continues to see his wife intermittently for
nearly four years.
1910
TD resumes work on Jennie Gerhardt, finishing a draft in
which Jennie and Lester Kane marry. Sara helps with the
editing.
1911
After readers in his circle advise him that the happy ending
rings false, TD revises Jennie Gerhardt. He also finishes a
draft of The “Genius” and begins The Financier. In
October, Jennie Gerhardt is published by Harper’s (after
considerable cuts by the publisher and others) to some
glowing reviews. In November, TD takes a European tour
to research The Financier, simultaneously working on a
travel book that will become A Traveler at Forty. Upon his
return to New York (April 1912), TD works furiously on
The Financier, which Harper’s convinces him to divide into
a trilogy ( The Trilogy of Desire).
1912
Wellesley graduate and TD’s lover, Anna Tatum, tells him a
story about her Quaker family that will become the basis
of The Bulwark. The Financier is published in October, to
good reviews. In December, TD returns to Chicago for
three months to continue research on the next volume of
The Trilogy of Desire, and meets Chicago literati, including
Floyd Dell, Edgar Lee Masters, John Cowper Powys,
Sherwood Anderson, Margaret Anderson (of Little
Review), Hamlin Garland, Henry Blake Fuller, and Little
Theater actress Kirah Markham.
1913
TD returns to New York in winter, working on Traveler for
Century and The Titan for Harpers. In summer, writes a