Nationality United Kingdom Spouse(s) James Albert Panton Parents William Powell Frith | Known for writing Children five | |
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Born 18 October 1847 Regents Park Books A Gentlewoman's Home: Th, From Kitchen to Garret, Leaves from a Life, NOOKS & CORNERS (ILLUSTR, Fresh Leaves and Gree |
Jane Ellen Panton or Jane Ellen Frith Panton; Jane Ellen Frith (18 October 1847 – 13 May 1923) was a British writer.
Contents
Life
Panton was born as Jane Ellen Frith in Regents Park in 1847. Her father, William Powell Frith was a very successful painter and Panton reports that he showed very little interest in his children. After her mother, Isabelle Jane, died in 1880 she found out that her father had a mistress and more children. At this point her father married his former mistress.
Panton appeared as a model in the 1859 painting trilogy Past and Present by Augustus Egg which coincidentally deals with a spouse being unfaithful. She also appeared in other two paintings; one by her father and the other by Alfred Elmore. Her father's house would host visits by Charles Dickens and John Ruskin.
She married James Albert Panton. at All Saints' Church in Kensington on 10 August 1869. Her husband was a partner in a family brewery business and he was brought out by his brother's widow in 1882. They lived briefly in Bournemouth before moving to Bromley. Panton's friend was the writer Dinah Craik who lived nearby. Panton decided to write to raise money and she pitched the idea of articles on home furnishing to the Ladies Pictorial magazine. Panton's articles and the idea of writing about interior design was original. Panton not only wrote but found that she could earn substantial sums by becoming an interior design consultant. Her novels were numerous but "undistinguished".
Panton died in Bloomsbury in 1923.
Works
Most of the Game (1911)