Journalist, born in Sioux City, Iowa, USA. The twin of rival agony aunt Ann Landers, she launched her own Dear Abby advice column in 1956. It too became an internationally syndicated column, and she gained a dedicated following as well as many public service awards, particularly for publicizing public-health issues.
Abigail Van Buren is a pseudonym or pen name used by the writers of the Dear Abby column, Pauline Phillips (born July 4, 1918) and her successor, her daughter Jeanne Phillips.
When Pauline Esther Friedman Phillips founded the column in 1956, she took on the pen name of Abigail Van Buren; According to Pauline, she combined the name of the biblical character Abigail, mentioned in the Book of Samuel, with the last name of former U.S. President Martin Van Buren, to form her pseudonym.
Pauline was an identical twin: her sister, Esther Pauline Friedman Lederer, who was 17 minutes older than Pauline, wrote the Ann Landers column, which was also syndicated internationally.
As competing columnists, however, the sisters did not have a happy relationship.
When Pauline retired in 2002, her daughter Jeanne continued writing the column under the pseudonym of Abigail Van Buren.
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