Marie Bullock, Founder of Academy of Poets

Marie Bullock, who in 1934 founded the Academy of American Poets--which in the intervening years has given hundreds of thousands of dollars to foster the production of American poetry--has died in New York City, it was reported this week.

She was 75 and died Christmas Day of what was described as a “prolonged illness.”

Born in Paris to American parents, she moved to New York in 1933 with her husband, Hugh.

Distressed by the fact that American poets were not held in the same esteem that their European counterparts enjoyed, Mrs. Bullock founded the academy and began awarding two $10,000 poetry prizes each year in addition to a series of lesser cash prizes.