might develop into a useful woman spared no pains in
endeavoring to secure for her the education the child very
early showed a desire to obtain; and with this end in view
she was sent to Newport, R. I., in her fourteenth year,
having already spent one year at the Institute for Colored
Youth in Philadelphia, and Mrs. Coppin, then Miss Fannie
Jackson, with her vigorous intellect, aided the inspiration
the mother had begun. In 1877 Miss Silone graduated as
valedictorian of a large class from Rogers High School of
Newport; and although the only Colored member of her class,
and the first graduate of color, invariably she was treated
with the utmost courtesy by teachers, scholars and such
members of the School Board as Thomas Wentworth Higginson,
T. Coggeshall, and others.

Two years later she graduated from the Rhode Island State
Normal School in Providence, and soon began her life work as
a teacher. During the eight years spent in Lincoln
Institute, Jefferson City, Mo., she had charge of the
Department of Natural Science, and was the first woman to be
elected to a professorship in that institution.

In 1889 Miss Silone was married to Prof. W. W. Yates,
principal of Phillips School, Kansas City, Mo., and removed
to that city, where since she has been engaged in either
public or private school work.

From the age of nine years she has been writing for the
press, and her articles have appeared in many leading
periodicals--for a long time under the signature "R. K.