Anna Leonowens and Hammerstein's 1951 hit musical "The King and I". During the course of her life, Leonowens also lived in Aden, Australia, Singapore, the United States and Canada. Among other achievements, she co-founded the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design. Anna Leonowens' mother, Mary Ann Glascott, married her father, Sergeant Thomas Edwards, a non-commissioned officer in the Honourable East India Company's Corps of Sappers and Miners, on 15 March 1829 in St James's Church, Tannah, Bombay Presidency, British India. Edwards was from London and a former cabinetmaker. She was born in Ahmednagar district, India, on 5 November 1831, three months
Anna Leonowens enterprise was not a financial success, it established her reputation as an educator. In 1862, Leonowens accepted an offer made by the consul in Singapore, Tan Kim Ching, to teach the wives and children of Mongkut, King of Siam. The king wished to give his 39 wives and concubines and 82 children a modern Western education on scientific secular lines, which earlier missionaries' wives had not provided. Leonowens sent her daughter Avis to school in England, and took her son Louis with her to Bangkok. She succeeded Dan Beach Bradley, an American missionary, as teacher to the Siamese court. Leonowens