 She trained as a teacher at Brantford Model School and Toronto Normal School, but always had an eye on a literary career.She had poetry printed as early as 1880, two years before she fully qualified as a teacher.A period of supply teaching in the Brantford area ended in December 1884, when she travelled to New Orleans after persuading "The Globe" newspaper in Toronto and the "Advertiser" in London, Ontario to pay her for articles about the World Cotton Centennial.