Effie Knowles was born in Key West in 1892 and died in Miami in 1984 at the age of 92. Knowles began her practice of law in 1926. For a period of 19 years, beginning in 1934, she served as an attorney in the Department of Justice. She returned to private practice in 1953 in Miami, and served as an attorney for the Seminole Tribe of Florida for over 20 years, beginning in 1955.
Novelist and playwright Evelyn Wilde Mayerson was associate professor of English and director of the composition program at the University of Miami, from where she received her B.A. in 1963. She is the author of several books set in South Florida including "No Enemy but Time" (1983) and "Miami: A Saga" (1994), as well as other titles. Her play "Marjory", about the life of Marjory Stoneman Douglas, was commissioned by the Coconut Grove Playhouse to celebrate Miami's centennial and debuted in 1996.
