Kidd was born Mildred Virginia Kidd in the Germantown district of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, the youngest daughter of Charles Kidd, a printer, and Zetta Daisy Whorley. She had polio at the age of 2, and was paralyzed for a year from the chest down. Growing up she attended the Berlitz School of Languages where she developed fluency in Spanish, Latin, Italian, French, and German. Kidd discovered science fiction at the age of nine, and became an active science fiction fan. She was a Futurian and, in 1941, became one of the founding members of the Vanguard Amateur Press Association. She did not attend college, saying "because I couldn't go to the University of Chicago, and I wouldn't go to any other." She married opera singer Jack Emden in 1943 (the marriage lasted until 1947), and then fellow writer James Blish; the latter marriage lasted until 1963. She had four children: Karen Anne Emden (born 1944), Asa Benjamin Blish (born and died 1947), Dorothea Elisabeth Blish (born 1954), and Charles Benjamin Blish (born 1956).
Kidd was born Mildred Virginia Kidd in the Germantown district of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, the youngest daughter of Charles Kidd, a printer, and Zetta Daisy Whorley. She had polio at the age of 2, and was paralyzed for a year from the chest down. Growing up she attended the Berlitz School of Languages where she developed fluency in Spanish, Latin, Italian, French, and German. Kidd discovered science fiction at the age of nine, and became an active science fiction fan. She was a Futurian and, in 1941, became one of the founding members of the Vanguard Amateur Press Association. She did not attend college, saying "because I couldn't go to the University of Chicago, and I wouldn't go to any other." She married opera singer Jack Emden in 1943 (the marriage lasted until 1947), and then fellow writer James Blish; the latter marriage lasted until 1963. She had four children: Karen Anne Emden (born 1944), Asa Benjamin Blish (born and died 1947), Dorothea Elisabeth Blish (born 1954), and Charles Benjamin Blish (born 1956).
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