Margaret Mitchell (1900-1949) was an American journalist and writer. Born in Atlanta, Georgia, she was creatively inspired as a young child. She wrote short stories, written down by her mother and stored for future use. After two abortive marriage situations in the early 1920s, she started a job as a journalist working for the “Atlanta Journal Sunday Magazine”. Writing under the name, “Peggy Mitchell”, she wrote over 100 articles for the magazine. She married in 1925 to Robert Marsh. In 1926 while recovering from a broken ankle, she began to write “Gone With The Wind”. Finally publishing in 1936 the novel was wildly successful, selling over a million copies in the first six months. Critically acclaimed it was awarded the Pulitzer Prize in 1937. Gone With the Wind was Mitchell’s only novel. She died tragically in 1949 as the result of being hit by a speeding taxi driver. Encyclopedia