Rawlings is so much identified with Florida that many readers assume she was a native, but in fact she didn’t live in the state until she was 32. Marjorie Kinnan was born in 1896 in Washington, D.C.

For my birthday this year, my mother, an artist, gave me what is already perhaps my most prized possession: a portrait of Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings' home at Cross Creek. It's a lush pastel drawing ...