21 Dec | Women’s Words & Works

Posted on by

Julia Ann Gleason Stone (21 Dec 1818 – 21 Jul 1900 | Warren MA – Cleveland OH) seamstress, wife of well-known Midwest industrialist / New England bridge builder Amasa Stone.

Laura Dewey Lynn Bridgman (21 Dec 1829 – 24 May 1889 | Hanover NH – Boston MA) poet, pioneer deaf-blind student, developed unique tapping alphabet and handwriting system.

Mary Virginia Hawes Terhune (21 Dec 1830 – 03 Jun 1922 | Amelia VA – New York NY) novelist, essayist, cookbook writer, short story writer, social etiquette commentator, pen name Marion Harland.

Henrietta Szold (21 Dec 1860 – 13 Feb 1945 | Baltimore MD – Jerusalem EY) author, memoirist, Jewish-American, women’s US Zionist leader, Hadassah Women’s Organization founder.

19 Dec | Women’s Words & Works

Posted on by

Mary Ashton Rice Livermore (19 Dec 1820 – 23 May 1905 | Boston MA – Melrose MA) editor, author, essayist, journalist, memoirist, suffragist, newspaper founder, women’s biographer, Universalist minister, women’s rights activist, temperance advocate, Civil War Sanitary Commission member.

Jane Cunningham Croly (19 Dec 1829 – 23 Dec 1901 | New York NY – Lakewood NJ) suffragist, memoirist, journalist, columnist, Sorosis women’s press club founder, General Federation of Women’s Clubs founder.

Ada Lydia Howard (19 Dec 1829 – 02 Mar 1907 | Temple NH – Methuen MA) educator, first female president of Wellesley College.

Susan Huntington Gilbert Dickinson (19 Dec 1830 – 12 May 1913 | Old Deerfield MA – Amherst MA) poet, writer, editor, traveler, intimate and sister-in-law of Emily Dickinson.

17 Dec | Women’s Words & Works

Posted on by

Deborah Sampson Gannett (17 Dec 1760 – 29 Apr 1827 | Plympton MA – Sharon MA) diarist, memoirist, political activist, Continental soldier.

Delia Ann Webster (17 Dec 1817 – 18 Jan 1904 | Vergennes VT – Jeffersonville IN) teacher, abolitionist, Underground Railroad activist, girls’ school founder, aka The Petticoat Abolitionist.

Celia Logan Connelly (17 Dec 1837 – 18 Jun 1904 | Philadelphia PA – New York NY) author, actress, aka L. Fairfax, journalist, playwright, translator, social activist / organizer.

Kate M. Youngman (17 Dec 1841 – 29 Sep 1910 | Kingston NY – Tokyo JP) nurse, missionary, founded Ihaien Leprosy Hospital in Tokyo.

16 Dec | Women’s Words & Works

Posted on by

Josephine Shaw Lowell (16 Dec 1843 – 12 Oct 1905 | Roxbury MA – New York NY) Unitarian, nonfiction author, Progressive reform leader, consumers league founder. 

Helen Frances [Fanny] Garrison Villard (16 Dec 1844 – 05 Jul 1928 | Boston MA – Dobbs Ferry NY) author, speaker, suffragist, founding member National Association for the Advancement of Colored People [NAACP].

Mary Hartwell Catherwood (16 Dec 1847 – 26 Dec 1902 | Luray OH – Chicago IL) biographer, historical romance novelist, short fiction magazine writer, pen names Mary Hartwell and Lewtrah.

Clara Endicott Sears (16 Dec 1863 – 25 Mar 1963 | Boston MA – Boston MA) author, historian, preservationist, founded Fruitlands Museum.

14 Dec | Women’s Words & Works

Posted on by

Mary Tappan Wright (14 Dec 1851 – 25 Aug 1916 | Steubenville OH – Cambridge MA) novelist, short story writer.

Lavinia Norman (14 Dec 1882 – 22 Jan 1983 | Montgomery WV – Washington DC) lifelong educator, French / English / Latin teacher, original founding member of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority / first sorority founded by African-American women at Howard University.

Helen Steketee (14 Dec 1882 – 23 Aug 1974 | Grand Rapids MI – Grand Rapids MI) artist, still-life / landscape painter.

Jane Bailey Cowl (14 Dec 1883 – 22 Jun 1950 | Boston MA – Santa Monica CA) playwright, stage / film actress, WWII co-director of NYC Stage Door Canteen, wrote in collaboration with Jane Murfin, often used joint pseudonym Allan Langdon Martin.

Ethel Browne Harvey (14 Dec 1885 – 02 Sep 1965 | Baltimore MD – Falmouth MA) author, zoologist, embryologist, women’s educational rights activist / advocate.

12 Dec | Women’s Words & Works

Posted on by

Martha Jane Coston (12 Dec 1826 – 09 Jul 1904 | Baltimore MD – Philadelphia PA) businesswoman, Coston emergency machine flare inventor / purveyor.

Sarah Brown Ingersoll Cooper (12 Dec 1835 – 11 Dec 1896 | Cazenovia NY – San Francisco CA) editor, educator, suffragist, philanthropist, women’s rights activist, kindergarten advocate / founder, treasurer for General Federation of Women’s Clubs, founded Jackson Street Kindergarten Association [in 1879, later renamed Golden Gate Kindergarten Association].

Caroline Lake Quiner Ingalls (12 Dec 1839 – 20 Apr 1924 | Brookfield WI – De Smet SD) aka Ma Ingalls, folk / literary / mother / pioneer figure.

Charlotte Frances Felt Wilder (12 Dec 1839 – 03 Dec 1916 | Templeton MA – Manhattan KS) author, novelist, Methodist, civic leader, club woman, magazine writer, juvenile religious writer.

Charlotte [Lottie] Digges Moon (12 Dec 1840 – 24 Dec 1912 | Albemarle County VA – Kobe Harbor JP) teacher, evangelist, missionary, one of first US women to earn Master’s Degree in Languages.

10 Dec | Women’s Words & Works

Posted on by

Caroline Mehitable Fisher Sawyer (10 Dec 1812 – 19 May 1894 | Newton MA – Somerville MA) poet, author, essayist, translator, social activist, short fiction writer, Universalist’s women’s and children’s societies advocate.

Jane [Jeanie] McDowell Foster (10 Dec 1829 – 17 Jan 1903 | Pittsburgh PA – Pittsburgh PA) diarist, wife of songwriter Stephen Foster, aka Jane Denny McDowell Wiley, inspiration for song “Jeanie with the Light Brown Hair”.

Emily Dickinson (10 Dec 1830 – 15 May 1886 | Amherst MA – Amherst MA) poet, baker, literary figure.

Mary Louisa Parmalee Peebles (10 Dec 1833 – 25 Apr 1915 | Lansingburgh NY – Lansingburgh NY) children’s author, pen name: Lynde Palmer.

Anna Mebus Martin (10 Dec 1843 – 10 Jul 1925 | DEU – Mason County TX) seamstress, entrepreneur, textile trader, Texas rancher, German-American, bank owner / founder, first female bank president born outside US.

09 Dec | Women’s Words & Works

Posted on by

Sarah [Tabitha] Babbitt (09 Dec 1799 – 10 Dec 1853 | Hardwick MA – Harvard MA) Shaker, inventor, weaver, tool-maker, member of Harvard Shaker Community, invented false teeth / circular saw / spinning wheel head [but did not patent any of her inventions].

Elizabeth Buffum Chace (09 Dec 1806 – 12 Dec 1889 | Providence RI – Providence RI) Quaker, abolitionist, social reformer, women’s rights activist, president Rhode Island Suffrage, Pembroke College co-founder.

Mary Fletcher Benton Scranton (09 Dec 1832 – 08 Oct 1909 | Belchertown MA – Seoul SK) Methodist Episcopal missionary, first Woman’s Foreign Missionary in Korea, founded Tal Syeng Day School for Women in Seoul and the Training School for Bible Women.

Emma Abbott (09 Dec 1850 – 05 Jan 1891 | Chicago IL – Salt Lake City UT) operatic soprano, impresario / opera company founder.

Ida Sophia Scudder (09 Dec 1870 – 23 May 1960 | Ranipet IND – Kodaikanal IND) doctor, medical missionary, women’s health activist, treated plague / leprosy / cholera, founded Christian Medical College & Hospital in Vellore, India.

05 Dec | Women’s Words & Works

Posted on by

Elizabeth Cabot Agassiz (05 Dec 1822 – 27 Jun 1907 | Boston MA – Arlington MA) author, educator, Radcliffe College co-founder / first president, natural history researcher.

Jane Loeau (05 Dec 1828 – 30 Jul 1873 | Waimea HI – Puunui HI) Chiefess of Kingdom of Hawaii, controversial royal Hawaiian family member.

Susan Hale (05 Dec 1833 – 17 Sep 1910 | Boston MA – Matunuck RI) artist, author, educator, world traveler, literary / Unitarian family member.

Alice Brown (05 Dec 1857 – 21 Jun 1948 | Hampton Falls NH – Boston MA) poet, novelist, biographer, playwright.

Maria Louise Anna Beaudet (05 Dec 1859 – 31 Dec 1947 | Tours FR – New York NY) opera singer, French Canadian, stage / silent film actress, opera touring company founder.

03 Dec | Women’s Words & Works

Posted on by

Barbara Hauer Fritchie (03 Dec 1766 – 18 Dec 1862 | Lancaster PA – Frederick City MD) folk figure, American Civil War Union activist.

Margaret [Peggy] O’Neal Eaton (03 Dec 1799 – 08 Nov 1879 | Washington DC – Washington DC) folk / political figure, involved in US President Andrew Jackson Petticoat Affair.

Louisa Susannah Cheves McCord (03 Dec 1810 – 23 Nov 1879 | Charleston SC – Charleston SC) poet, author, suffragist, playwright, translator, political essayist.

Phoebe Apperson Hearst (03 Dec 1842 – 13 Apr 1919 | Franklin MO – Pleasanton CA) feminist, suffragist, philanthropist, anthropology museum founder, founding member of National Congress of Mothers, benefactor / director of Golden Gate Kindergarten Association, co-founded all-girls National Cathedral School in Washington, DC.

Ellen Henrietta Swallow Richards (03 Dec 1842 – 30 Mar 1911 | Dunstable MA – Boston MA) author, professor, environmental chemist, safety / industrial engineer, experimental researcher in domestic science, first to apply chemistry to study of nutrition, first American woman to obtain a degree in chemistry, first female student and professor at MIT [Massachusetts Institute of Technology], first American woman accepted to any school of science and technology.