Main Street characters

Appears from the start

An imaginative, college-educated young woman who works as a librarian in St. Paul and dreams of making ordinary places more beautiful and humane. Marriage brings her to Gopher Prairie, Minnesota, where her enthusiasm for reform meets habits and judgments she finds stifling.

Also known as Will Kennicott

First appears in chapter 2

A capable country doctor from Gopher Prairie who courts Carol in St. Paul. Proud of his town and his useful place within it, he is affectionate, practical, and largely puzzled by Carol's conviction that local life needs transformation.

First appears in chapter 6

A thoughtful lawyer in Gopher Prairie whose quiet manner and literary interests make him seem to Carol like a possible ally. He speaks of the town's numbing influence with insight, though he has made accommodation rather than rebellion his way of living there.

First appears in chapter 5

A teacher and leading member of Gopher Prairie's small intellectual circle. Energetic, civic-minded, and initially welcoming to Carol, she believes in gradual usefulness more than sweeping aesthetic reform.

First appears in chapter 4

A young Swedish immigrant whom Carol employs as a maid. Warm, capable, and eager for friendship as well as work, she becomes one of the few people in town with whom Carol can relax without social calculation.

First appears in chapter 7

A Swedish-American handyman and horse trader who lives at the edge of respectable Gopher Prairie society. Blunt and self-sufficient, he treats the town's class rules with open contempt and attracts Carol by refusing its pretenses.

First appears in chapter 5

A fashionable member of Gopher Prairie's leading social set and the wife of merchant Harry Haydock. She is friendly when Carol observes the town's conventions, but her confidence in local standards leaves little room for Carol's criticism.

First appears in chapter 5

A prosperous Gopher Prairie merchant, booster, and member of Will's social circle. He regards commercial growth and club sociability as strong evidence that the town already offers everything reasonable people need.

First appears in chapter 5

A devout, censorious neighbor who treats private behavior as a matter for public supervision. Her son Cy's misbehavior rarely weakens her certainty about the faults of other townspeople.

First appears in chapter 5

Mrs. Bogart's unruly adolescent son, whose pranks and boastfulness contrast with his mother's rigid moral claims. He is one of the young people formed by the town's mixture of repression and tolerated cruelty.

First appears in chapter 20

A former Gopher Prairie boy who has become a nationally successful automobile executive. His return excites the town and presents Carol with an apparently sophisticated outsider who nevertheless celebrates the values she questions.

First appears in chapter 24

A young tailor of Swedish background who comes to work in Gopher Prairie. Sensitive, ambitious, and dissatisfied with the narrow future available to him, he shares Carol's hunger for beauty and a wider life.

First appears in chapter 30

A young teacher newly arrived in Gopher Prairie. Athletic, candid, and less guarded than the town expects a woman teacher to be, she becomes friendly with Carol and soon attracts close scrutiny from moralizing neighbors.

First appears in chapter 19

Carol and Will's young son. His needs bind Carol more closely to domestic life while also sharpening her concern about the kind of town and expectations that will shape him.