Virginia Hamilton Adair (February 28, 1913, New York City – September 16, 2004, Claremont, California) was an American poet who became famous later in life with the 1996 publication of Ants on the Melon.
[3] Exposed to poetry as a young child through her father, she began writing her own poems regularly at age six.
These included her 1936 marriage to prominent historian Douglass Adair,[1] motherhood (she had three children),[1] and an academic career.
Adair's return to publishing came in the 1990s, following her husband's 1968 suicide,[1] her retirement from teaching, and her loss of sight from glaucoma.
Adair's friend and fellow poet Robert Mezey forwarded some of her work to Alice Quinn, The New Yorker's poetry editor.