Best-selling author Gene Stratton-Porter (1863-1924) aimed to inspire appreciation of nature in readers. She lived and worked at Limberlost Cabin in Geneva and then at Wildflower Woods here. She wrote for magazines such as Outing and Ladies' Home Journal, published photographs and studies of life in nearby woods and swamps, and created novels that blended fiction with vivid descriptions of nature. By 1924, ten million copies of her books had sold, including the internationally popular Freckles (1904) and Girl of the Limberlost (1909). She gained financial independence through her writing at a time before many women had professional careers. In California in the 1920s, she pursued production of movies based on her novels and had organized her own movie production company by 1924.