Hemingway’s daughter-in-law talks about his life

Valerie Danby-Smith spent two years as Ernest Hemingway’s personal secretary, before marrying his son and becoming a Hemingway herself.

Valerie Hemingway married Gregory Hemingway, the author’s youngest son, five years after Ernest Hemingway died.

Valerie Hemingway talked Monday night in a near-capacity Charles V. Park Library’s Auditorium about her time with Ernest Hemingway and the two years she spent as his personal secretary.

Valerie Hemmingway, Ernest Hemingway’s daughter-in-law, told stories of how she heard of him as a young girl, and then how many years later her writing career brought them together. She ended up as his personal secretary for two years.

She told her own story of the Hemingway she knew.

“I knew him, and others who knew him well also knew him, as a person who was intensely interested in other people,” she said.

She ended with a few questions from the audience, which turned into more stories from the “Hemingway dinner table.”

“Valerie brought wonderful insight. She brought a humanization to Hemingway that would not be possible without her stories. We hoped that students would be exposed and inspired by what she had to say,” said Frank Boles, director of the Clarke Historical Library.

The Clarke Historical Library sponsored the event, as it teamed up with The Michigan Hemingway Society.

Pickney senior Kelli King came because she is fascinated by Hemingway.

“I had an A.P. English teacher who loved Hemingway. I was interested to hear what people who actually knew him had to say,” said King, the president of Sigma Tau Delta, an international English honors society.

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