Mary Higgins Clark - Early Life

Early Life

Mary Theresa Eleanor Higgins was born December 24, 1927, the second child and only daughter of Irish immigrant Luke Higgins and his wife Nora, who was also of Irish descent. Mary Higgins Clark arrived less than nineteen months after the birth of her older brother, Joseph, and her younger brother Johnny followed three years later. Even as a small child, Higgins Clark was interested in writing, composing her first poem at age seven and often crafting short plays for her friends to enact. She began keeping a journal when she was seven, noting in her very first entry that "Nothing much happened today."

The family lived off the earnings from their Irish pub and were fairly well-off, owning a home in the Bronx as well as a summer cottage on Long Island Sound. Although the Great Depression began when Higgins Clark was still a baby, her family was initially not affected, and even insisted on feeding the men who knocked on their door looking for work. By the time Higgins Clark was ten, however, the family began to experience financial trouble, as many of their customers were unable to pay the bar tabs they had run up. Higgins Clark's father was forced to lay off several employees and work longer hours, spending no more than a few hours at home each day. The family was thrown into further turmoil in 1939, when young Mary returned home from an early Mass to discover that her father had died in his sleep.

Nora Higgins, now a widow with three young children to support, soon discovered that few employers were willing to hire a 52-year-old woman who had not held a job in over fourteen years. To pay the bills, Higgins Clark was forced to move out of her bedroom so that her mother could rent it out to paying boarders.

Six months after their father's death, Higgins Clark's older brother cut his foot on a piece of metal and contracted severe osteomyelitis. Higgins Clark and her mother prayed constantly for him, and their neighbors came en masse to give blood for the many transfusions the young boy needed. Despite the dire predictions of the doctors, Joseph Higgins survived. Higgins Clark credits his recovery to the power of their prayers.

When Higgins Clark graduated from Saint Francis Xavier Grammar School she received a scholarship to continue her education at the Villa Maria Academy, a school run by the nuns of the Congregation de Notre Dame de Montreal. There, the principal and other teachers encouraged Higgins Clark to develop her writing, although they were somewhat less than pleased when she began spending her class time writing stories instead of paying attention to the lesson. At sixteen Higgins Clark made her first attempt at publishing her work, sending an entry to True Confessions which was rejected.

To help pay the bills, she worked as a switchboard operator at the Shelton Hotel, where she often listened in to the residents' conversations. In her memoir she recalls spending much time eavesdropping on Tennessee Williams, but complained that he never said anything interesting. On her days off, Higgins Clark would window shop, mentally choosing the clothes she would wear when she finally became a famous writer.

Despite Higgins Clark's contribution to the family finances, the money her mother earned babysitting was not enough, and the family lost their house and moved into a small three-room apartment. When Joseph graduated from high school in 1944, he immediately enlisted in the Navy, both to serve his country during war and to help his mother pay her bills. Six months after his enlistment he contracted spinal meningitis and died. Although the family mourned Joseph's death deeply, as his dependent, Nora Higgins was guaranteed a pension for life, and no longer needed her daughter's help to pay the bills.