Edna Yost

Edna Yost (November 16, 1889, Clearfield County, Pennsylvania - September 10, 1971, New York City) wrote articles, poems, short stories, and books. She grew up in Houtzdale, Pennsylvania. She received her A.B. degree from Allegheny College in 1913. She was invited to join Phi Beta Kappa and the women's fraternity Kappa Kappa Gamma and became a member of the American Association of University Women. She worked as an editorial assistant on the American Journal of Public Health, published by the American Public Health Association, from 1919 to 1921. She also did editorial work for the American Society of Mechanical Engineers in New York from 1921 to 1925. She wrote articles for the Dictionary of American Biography as well as magazine articles, poems, short stories, and books.

In 1944, Yost worked with Lillian Moller Gilbreth, the first woman engineering professor at Purdue University, to research and write about improving the environment for people with disabilities. Their work was directly relevant to injured servicemen returning from World War II. They published two books, Normal Lives for the Disabled''' (1944) and Straight Talk to Disabled Veterans (1945). The books argued that it was possible for disabled persons to have a productive working life. Normal Lives'' was described as "a great help in laying a general foundation for the basic adjustment of a disabled individual". Yost also went on to write a biography of Frank and Lillian Gilbreth, efficiency experts who applied scientific management techniques to a wide variety of tasks.

Courtesans and female saints were the only women who, as a result of their own actions, became worthy of being written about. Queens and raving beauties decorated the pages of some of the books I read [as a child], but such women as these were born to fame. And realistic young women who read about them could never hope to emulate them for the simple reason that we had already been born without the qualifications. There were still saints and courtesans. But the saints seemed to far removed and we had been trained to believe that courtesans were wicked and did not fit well into the modern scheme of things.

Death Yost died September 10, 1971, in New York City.