The Part Taken by Women in American History/Women as Philanthropists
Women as Philanthropists.
DOROTHEA LYNDE DIX (1805-1887.)
In all past ages the weak, the lame, the blind and the insane were supposed to be beyond cure or even help. Only within recent years have the strong strived to help the condition of those they often pitied but more often despised. The insane particularly were often judged as under the control of Satan, and any effort to lessen their sufferings or to improve their condition seemed the same as helping the evil one. In 1730 the first asylum for the humane treatment of these unfortunates was established in England, and in 1750 Benjamin Franklin and others in the New World added a department for demented people in the Pennsylvania Hospital. But little was done for the benefit of the insane, either in this country or in Europe until Dorothea Dix with strong and unyielding purpose began her heroic work in their behalf. She was eminently fitted for the work because she herself had seen only the hard side of life. Her home with her grandparents in Boston was a gloomy, joyless one, and she herself said later in life, "I never knew childhood." Yet, the very hardness of this experience fitted her for her life work. After years of teaching, her mind was opened to the neglect and suffering of weak-minded and insane. It is hard to believe the shocking conditions which existed at that day in the treatment of the insane, the patients being confined in cells with no floor but the earth, no windows, consequently no ventilation. The straw on which they slept was changed once a week, at which time the occupants were given their only exercise. Such were the conditions Miss Dix found when she visited the prisons, hospitals and retreats in every state this side of the Rocky Mountains. As she gazed at the appalling sight of human beings in cages, closets and cellars, many of them naked, most of them chained, and all of them thrashed into obedience, she realized that a radical and immediate change was necessary. In Providence at last was found a small asylum that gave its patients wise and kind treatment, but it was much overcrowded, and Miss Dix at once resolved to gather the means for enlargement and make the institution an object lesson. She went to the richest man in the city, who was also notoriously close-fisted, and to him she related with her wonderful power of feeling and eloquence the pathos and tragedy of the condition of these benighted souls. To the surprise of everyone the wealthy man listened spellbound, and at length exclaimed: "Miss Dix, what do you want me to do?" "Sir, I want you to give $50,000 toward the enlargement of the insane hospital in your city," replied Miss Dix. "Madame, I will do it," said the rich man, with perhaps the first desire of his life to help suffering humanity, inspired by this young woman. This was the beginning which has changed the whole conditions of the institutions of our country, and started work along the right line for the insane and criminals.
In the Civil War Dorothea Dix offered her services to the Secretary of War as a nurse, and under her direction much was done to improve the hospitals and so relieve the suffering of those sick and wounded. At length, when four-score years old, well worn out with her work, she was invited to make her home in the asylum in Trenton, N. J., one of the many institutions founded by her. Here she was visited by a multitude of friends, while a continual flow of letters from all over the country brought to her the grateful expressions of the many she had aided. She died July 19, 1887, and one of the many prominent men who passed judgment on her work at this time said, "Thus has died and been laid at rest in the most quiet and unostentatious way the most useful and distinguished woman America has yet produced."
CAROLINE MARIA SEVERANCE.
Philanthropist. Mrs. Severance was the daughter of Orson and Caroline M. Seamore.-Was born in Canandaigua, N. Y., January 12, 1820. She was the valedictorian of her class in 1835, when she graduated from the Female Seminary at Geneva, N. Y. In 1840 she married Theodoric C. Severance, a banker of Cleveland, where she resided until 1855, then in Boston, and later in Los Angeles, Cal. She was the founder and first president of the New England Woman's College, of Boston, which antedated the well-known Sorosis Club, of New York, by only a few weeks, and Mrs. Severance is frequently called the mother of women's clubs in the United States. She has always been an active worker in woman's suffrage work, having lectured in various states. Has written several memorials and appeals on this subject, which have been read before the Woman's Congress. Has founded clubs in Los Angeles and Santa Barbara; is trustee of the Unitarian Library and president of the Los Angeles Free Kindergarten Association, and is one of the most progressive women of the present day in America. She is now spending the evening of her life in Los Angeles, Cal.
MARY TILESTON HEMENWAY.
Mary Tileston Hemenway, philanthropist, was born in New York City, in 1822; daughter of Thomas Tileston, a wealthy New York merchant. Her husband, a Boston business man, the owner of extensive silver mines in South America; acquired a large fortune, and after his death she came into possession of about $15,000,000, thus becoming the richest woman in Boston. During her long life Mrs. Hemenway bestowed much thought and money upon charitable and educational institutions. She gave the sum of $100,000 to found the Tileston Normal School, Wilmington, N. C. In 1876, when the existence of the Old South Meeting House, Boston, was threatened, she gave one-half of the $200,000 necessary to save the historic edifice from being torn down. In 1878 the series of free lectures for children was started at her suggestion in the Old South Church, which continued informally until 1883, when the regular free course of historical lectures for young people was inaugurated. In 1881 she established four annual prizes for High School pupils for the best essays on scientific topics and American history. She also established kitchen gardens, sewing schools, cooking schools and the Boston Normal School of Gymnastics; contributed duly to the support of archaeological expeditions and explorations in the Southwest and to the funds of the American Archaeological Institute; was the patroness of the "Journal of American Ethnology and Archaeology," and gave generously to the Boston Teachers' Mutual Benefit Association. After her death the trustees of her estate conveyed to the state board of education the "Boston Normal School of Household Arts," established by her, and which was subsequently transferred to Farmingham, Mass. She died in Boston, Mass., March 6, 1894.
MARTHA REED MITCHELL.
Was born March, 1818, in Westford, Mass. Her parents were Seth and Rhoda Reed. She was educated at Miss Fiske's School, Keene, N. H., and Mrs. Emma Willard's Seminary, in Troy, N. Y. In 1838 her family removed to what was then the wilds of Wisconsin. They traveled down the Erie Canal and by the chain of Great Lakes, the journey comprising three weeks before they reached their destination, the city of Milwaukee, Wis. Wisconsin was then a territory, and Milwaukee a village of only five hundred inhabitants. In 1841 Martha Reed married Alexander Mitchell, one of the sturdy pioneers of this Western country, and later one of the most prominent men in the state of Wisconsin. Mr. Mitchell amassed great wealth, but neither prosperity nor popularity deprived Mrs. Mitchell of her simple manner and her love and interest in the cause of the less fortunate. Mrs. Mitchell was ever ready with her means and personal efforts in all charitable work of her home city. She organized what is now known as the Protestant Orphan Asylum, and was its first treasurer, and for years she supported a mission kindergarten, where daily nearly one hundred children from the lowest grades of society were taught to be self-respecting and self-sustaining men and women. Art and artists are indebted to her for her liberal patronge. After the Civil War she established a winter home near Jacksonville, Fla., where she brought to great perfection tropical fruit-bearing trees, and many of the rare trees of foreign lands, among them the camphor and cinnamon from Ceylon, the tea plant from China, and some of the sacred trees of India. While here she became interested in the charities of this state, and St. Luke's Hospital stands among her monuments to her charitable work in Florida. Mrs. Mitchell will long be remembered as one of the moving spirits and able women of the early pioneer days in the West. She was one of the vice-regents of the Mt. Vernon Association.
CYNTHIA H. VAN NAME LEONARD.
Was born February 28, 1828, in Buffalo, N. Y. Was a pioneer in many fields of labor which have been invaded by women in this century. She was the first woman to stand behind a counter as a saleswoman, and was a member of the first Woman's Social and Literary Club organized in her city. In 1852 she married Charles E. Leonard, connected with the Buffalo Express, and later with the Commercial Advertiser of Detroit, Michigan. In 1856 Mr. and Mrs. Leonard moved to Clinton, Iowa, where he published the Herald. Mrs. Leonard was active in establishing schools and churches in this little frontier city, and when the war broke out she was foremost in all sanitary work, and assisted in opening the first soldiers' home in Iowa. In 1863 Mr. Leonard moved to Chicago, Ill., where Mrs. Leonard at once became prominent in the fair for the Freedmen's Aid Commission. She organized and was president of the Women's Club of that city, which later was called the Sorosis. Mrs. Leonard and Mrs. Waterman published a weekly paper in the interest of this club. Mrs. Leonard has been very active in shelter work for the unfortunate women of her own city, and through her efforts succeeded in establishing the Good Samaritan Society and the opening of a shelter for the unfortunate class of society. After the Chicago fire she worked constantly for the protection and assistance of these poor women. Mrs. Leonard is the mother of Lillian Russell, the well-known actress, whose name was Helen Leonard. She organized in New York the Science of Life Club. All Mrs. Leonard's daughters are well known and more or less prominent in the musical and theatrical world.
AMANDA L. AIKENS.
Editor and philanthropist. Mrs. Aikens was born in North Adams, Massachusetts, the 12th day of May, 1833. She received her education at Maplewood Institute, Pittsfield, Massachusetts. She married Andrew Jackson Aikens, and moved to Milwaukee, Wisconsin. In 1887 she began to edit the Woman's World, a department in her husband's paper, the Evening Wisconsin. During the Civil War she was one of the noted women workers of our country, and it was through her public appeals that the question of the national soldiers' homes was agitated. She raised money in Wisconsin for the Johns Hopkins Medical School in Baltimore, for the purpose of having women admitted on equal terms with men. She took an active interest in all charity and educational work in her state, and must be included among the prominent women up-builders of our country. Mrs. Aikens died in Milwaukee, the 20th of May, 1892.
ELIZABETH DICKSON JONES.
Born in Chicago October 6, 1862. Daughter of William Wallace and Fidelia Hill Norton Dickson. In 1884 married Joseph H. Jones, who has since died. Active in musical work; secretary of the Iowa Humane Society, and in 1904, James Callonan, former president, left the Iowa Humane Society $70,000 conditioned upon her being made secretary for life; was vice-president of the American Humane Society.
JUDITH WALKER ANDREWS.
Philanthropist. Mrs. Andrews was born in Fryeburg, Maine, April 26, 1826, and was educated at the academy in her home town. Her brother, Dr. Clement A. Walker, was appointed in charge of the hospital for the insane in Boston, and Mrs. Walker joined him there to assist in the work in which she was deeply interested. Her work in this line has been of great value. Since 1889, she has been very much interested in the child-widows of India and formed an association to carry out the plans of Pundita Ramabai. Mrs. Andrews and her co-workers are carrying on the management of a school at Puna, India.
HANNAH J. BAILEY.
PHOEBE APPERSON HEARST.
Philanthropist. The wife of Senator George Hearst, of California, was the daughter of R. W. Apperson, and was born December 3, 1842. She was married to George Hearst, June 15, 1862, and their only child is William Randolph Hearst, editor of the New York American and the San Francisco Examiner, and a syndicate of papers published in the principal cities in the United States. Mrs. Hearst, since her husband's death, has been very active in philanthropic work. She established and maintained in San Francisco free kindergarten classes and working girls' clubs for several years, and also classes for training kindergarten teachers in Washington City. The latter were maintained by her for almost ten years, and from these classes came the first kindergarten teachers in the public schools of Washington, D. C. In Lead, S. D., where she owns much mining interests, she has established a kindergarten for about three hundred children. She gave two hundred and fifty thousand dollars to build the National Cathedral School for girls in Washington, D. C. She paid the cost for the plans submitted by the architects of Europe and America for enlarging the University of California, and erected and equipped in connection with that university the Mining Building as a memorial to her husband; has given free libraries to the city of Lead, S. D., and also to Anaconda, Mont.; was the first president of the Century Club of San Francisco; vice-president of the Golden Gate Kindergarten Association; regent of the University of California, and vice-regent for California of the Mount Vernon Association. Mrs. Hearst is a woman of great ability, and has done much for the progress and educational improvement and advantages for education, not only in her own state of California, but in many places of the United States. She has helped and is helping to-day in many ways the less fortunate. She is one of the conspicuous women of America, and one to whom her country is greatly indebted.
ANNA ELIZA SEAMANS NAVE.
Well-known hospital worker in the Spanish-American War, and author of religious writings; was born at Defiance, Ohio, June 4, 1848; was the daughter of William and Mary Seamans; her husband, Orville J. Nave, was an army chaplain.
MRS. WILLIAM ZIEGLER.
The work done by Mrs. Ziegler for the blind deserves especial mention. Mrs. William Ziegler, of New York, founded and maintained, at an expense of twenty thousand dollars a year the Matilda Ziegler Magazine for the Blind. When she established this magazine she expressed the wish that it should never make public the name of the donor, but it was found necessary, to further its benefits, to allow her name to appear. This magazine has a printing plant of double the capacity of any other printing plant for the blind in the world. Five hundred thousand pages a month are printed. Ten blind girls work in the office, earning a dollar and a quarter a day, assembling the sheets for the magazine, which they do as correctly as those who can see. One of these girls is deaf and blind. The proof reader for the magazine is a blind man, a graduate of Columbia College.
GEORGIA TRADER.
Another woman who is doing splendid work for the blind is Miss Georgia Trader, of Avondale, Cincinnati, Ohio, who lost her sight very early in life. The Misses Florence and Georgia Trader, after finishing school, took up this work. They succeeded in establishing classes for the blind in the public schools of Cincinnati, and ultimately established a library with nearly two thousand volumes, from which the books in raised type are loaned to the blind all over the country, and as the government takes books for the blind free through the mails there is no knowing the good this work is doing. Miss Georgia Trader's greatest work has been the establishing of a working home for the blind girls, where she maintains thirteen destitute girls, for whom she furnishes employment in weaving rugs and other artistic work, which finds ready sale. They have purchased the girl-hood home of Alice and Phoebe Carey, with twenty-six acres of land, in the suburbs of Cincinnati, and through the co-operation of the Misses Trader's friends they have now established this home on a firm foundation, and will go on with this splendid work.
RUTH HINSHAW SPRAY.
Born in Mooresville, Indiana, February 16, 1848. The wife of Samuel J. Spray, of Indianapolis. Prominent as a teacher in the public schools and work for the protection of children and animals; also of the child labor organizations and in the international peace cause, Woman's Christian Temperance Union, Retail Clerks' Association and other associations for public welfare; is a resident of Salida, Colorado.
KATE WALLER BARRETT.
Born at Clifton, Stafford County, Virginia, January 24, 1858; is the daughter of Withers and Ann Eliza Stribling Waller; graduated in a course of nursing at the Florence Nightingale Training School and the St. Thomas Hospital of London; married Rev. Robert South Barrett in 1876; has long been an active worker in philanthropic work. Is the vice-president and general superintendent of the National Florence Crittenton Mission, of Washington, D. C, and now president of that institution; was a delegate to the convention for the discussion of the care of delinquent children in 1909, vice-president-at-large of the National Council of Women, member of the Mothers' Congress, League of Social Service, Daughters of the American Revolution, National Geographical Society, and is to-day a public speaker and one of the most prominent workers in the philanthropic work of the United States.
HELEN CULVER.
Born at Little Valley, New York, March 23, 1832; was a school teacher in her youth. In 1863 she was matron of the military hospital at Murfreesboro, Tennessee. In 1868 she entered into partnership with her cousin, Charles J. Hull, in the real estate business in Chicago, and dealt largely in properties of that city and of the West. After his death she built and endowed the four Hull biological laboratories for the University of Chicago ; was trustee of the Hull House Association from its organization in 1895, and is one of the noted philanthropists of the United States.
ELLA MARTIN HENROTIN.
Born in Portland, Maine, July, 1847; was the daughter of Edward Byam and Sarah Ellen Norris Martin; was educated in Europe, and in 1869 married Charles Henrotin, of Illinois; one of the leading spirits of the women's department of the World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago in 1893; president of the General Federation of Women's Clubs in 1894; was decorated by the Sultan of Turkey in 1893, and also made an "officier de l'Academie" by the French Republic in 1899, and decorated by Leopold II, in 1904; one of the foremost women in public and charitable work in Chicago.
MOTHER MARY ALPHONSA.
Was the daughter of Nathaniel Hawthorne, and in 1871 married George Parsons Lathrop. Both Mr. and Mrs. Lathrop were converts to the Catholic faith. Mrs Lathrop became greatly interested in the cause of those unfortunate people afflicted with cancer, and took up a course of study of this disease and its treatment at the Bellevue Hospital, New York. She worked among the poor and labored assiduously in their homes and in the hospitals. On the death of her husband she established in a house on Cherry street, New York City, a small hospital for these poor unfortunate creatures, who were turned out of other hospitals as incurable, or because they were too poor to pay for treatment. In addition to this, she established a home at Hawthorne, in Westchester County, and an order was formed to aid her in her work under a rule of the Third Order of St. Dominic. This charity is for those who are pronounced incurable, and is known as St. Rose's Free Cancer Hospital, with the country house in Westchester County. To this work Mrs. Lathrop consecrated her life, and entered the order and became its head, under the name of Mother Alphonsa. She has written some poems under the title "Along the Shore," and, with her husband, was the author of "Memories of Hawthorne" and "A Story of Courage."
MRS. GEORGE BLISS.
Is the daughter of Henry H. Casey and Anais Blanchet Casey. She married Mr. George Bliss, a distinguished Catholic lawyer, who was legal adviser of the late Archbishop Corrigan. He was knighted by Pope Leo XIII. In 1897 Mr. Bliss died. Mrs. Bliss* greatest work has been the establishment with other interested persons of the Free Day School and Creche for French children, located at 69 Washington Square, New York. This school is entirely dependent on the voluntary contributions, receiving no aid from the city treasury. She is vice-president of this association, and is president of the Tabernacle Society, whose headquarters is in the Convent of Perpetual Adoration, in Washington, D. C.
HARRIET L. CRAMER.
Was born in Fond du Lac County, Wisconsin, in 1848; is president and publisher of the Evening Wisconsin, which was founded by her hsuband, Hon. William E. Cramer, and of which he was editor until his death. She is the donor of the granite columns in the interior of the Church of Gesu, in Milwaukee, said to be the only columns of this kind in the country, and were placed there at a cost of $20,000. She, with her husband, gave forty acres of ground in Milwaukee County, upon which the house and school of the Good Shepherd are situated. To this institution Mr. Cramer left a large sum of money at his death, and Mrs. Cramer has been constantly adding to this. She is one of the most philanthropic, generous women in the charitable world of America.
MARY L. GILMAN.
Was born in Boston, Massachusetts. Her father, William Lynch, was a wealthy man of North End. In 1870 she married John E. Gilman, a prominent member of the Grand Army of the Republic, and at one time department commander of Massachusetts. Mrs. Gilman is prominent in women's relief corps work and the Ladies' Aid Association of the Soldiers' Home of Chelsea, and the home for destitute Catholic children. She was for some time organist of a church musical society.
FLORENCE MAGRUDER GILMORE.
Was born February 13, 1881, in Columbus, Ohio. Her father was James Gillespie, and her mother Florence Magruder Gilmore. Through her father Mrs. Gilmore is connected with the prominent families of Blaine, Ewing and Sherman, in this country, and, through her mother, with some of the well-known families of Scotland. She is engaged in doing settlement work under Catholic organizations in St. Louis; is a contributor to the America, Extension, Benzinger's, Messenger of the Sacred Heart, Rosary and Leader magazines.
MRS. RICHARD H. KEITH.
Is the founder of St. Anthony's Infant Home, Kansas City, Missouri.
KATHERINE BARDOL LAUTZ.
Was born in Rochester, New York, in 1842; is the daughter of Joseph Bardol and Mary Reinagle Bardol. Her husband is J. Adam Lautz, of Germany, at the head of the Lautz Soap Manufacturing Company, of Buffalo. She has been president of the St. Elizabeth's Hospital Association for many years; is director of the Working Boys' Home, Women's Educational and Industrial Union, St. James' Mission and Angel Guardian Mission.
MARGARET BISCHELL McFADDEN.
Was born in St. Louis, Missouri, but removed when a child to Winona, Minnesota. Their father was an extensive ship builder of St. Louis. In 1800 she married M. J. McFadden, one of the prominent business men of St. Paul, Minnesota. She has been twice elected president of the Guild of Catholic Women, one of the leading and most powerful religious organizations in the Northwest. She is active in all charitable work, and especially are her interests enlisted in the cause of young girls who are brought before the Juvenile Court, many of whom she has been able to save. Mrs. McFadden is greatly beloved, and is considered one of the prominent women of the Northwest.
SARAH McGILL.
Was born in New York City; is the daughter of James and Ellen McGill. She is a noted linguist, and has made quite a number of translations from the French, Spanish, Italian and German. During her residence in Mobile, Alabama, she was known on account of her splendid charitable work as the "Mother of the Orphans." She and her sister, Mary A. McGill, who is also an author, and active in all charitable work, were instrumental, with their brothers, in founding McGill Institute, in Mobile, and also the McGill Burse, in the American College in Rome, a fund for the education of students for the priesthood, in the Mobile diocese, and a fund for the building of churches. Associated with them in this splendid charity was their brother, Felix McGill. The McGill crypt, beneath the Chapel of the Visitation Convent, is a work of art.
AGNES McSHANE.
One of the founders of the Visiting Nurses' Association, a charitable organization, which works among the poor sick of Omaha. She is the wife of Felix J. McShane, a nephew of the distinguished philanthropist, Count Creighton, the benefactor of Creighton University.
KATHERINE KELLY MEAGHER.
Is president of the graduate chapter of the Visitation Convent Alumnae Association, treasurer of the Catholic Guild of Women, and prominently identified with the charitable and social clubs of St. Paul, Minnesota. She is the daughter of the late P. H. Kelly, and in 1907 married John B. Meagher.
MARY VIRGINIA MERRICK.
Is the daughter of Richard T. Merrick, a prominent lawyer of Washington, D. C, whose father, William Duhurst Merrick, was a member of the Maryland state legislature, and United States Senator from Maryland from 1838 to 1845. Miss Merrick was the founder of the Christ Child Society of Washington. She began her work by interesting her friends in the preparation of infants' outfits, to be given to the poor on Christmas Day, and in 1900 this little circle was formed into a society. Sewing classes, children's libraries, Sunday school classes were gradually added to the work of relief among the destitute children of Washington City. Articles of incorporation were taken out for the society, and to-day there is a membership of over six hundred of the prominent Catholic women of Washington, which includes many from official and diplomatic circles and the army and navy. There are to-day branches of this society in New York City, Omaha, Worcester, Massachusetts ; Chicago, Illinois; Ellicott City, Maryland, and Davenport, Iowa. Miss Merrick is the author of a life of Christ (for children) and translator of Mme. de Segur's life of Christ, also for children.
MARY RICHARDS.
MRS. THOMAS F. RYAN.
Was the daughter of Captain Barry, who was the owner of a line of vessels plying between Baltimore and the West Indies. She married Thomas F. Ryan. She and her husband have been generous contributors to many of the charitable institutions and philanthropic work of the church, especially in Virginia. They furnished the interior of the Sacred Heart Cathedral of Richmond, which had been given to the city by her husband, at a cost of $500,000; built the Sacred Heart Church, Washington Ward, and Sacred Heart Cathedral School at Richmond; church and convent at Falls Church, Virginia; contributed to churches at Hot Springs and Harrisburg, Virginia, and Keyser, West Virginia; the chapel at Suffern, New York, where their summer home is located, and together gave Ryan Hall and a wing to Georgetown University, Georgetown, D. C. She was decorated with the Cross of St. Gregory and made a Countess by Pope Pius X for her philanthropic work.
MYRA E. KNOX SEMMES.
Was the daughter of William Knox, a prominent banker and planter of Montgomery, Alabama, and Annie O. Lewis Knox, whose family was related to the Fairfaxes, Washingtons, and other families of Virginia. Her husband was Thomas J. Semmes, a distinguished jurist, prominent in the political affairs of Louisiana, and was a member of the convention in 1861 which passed the articles of secession in the state of Louisiana. Since her husband's death Mrs. Semmes has devoted her life to charity and benevolence, and has erected a magnificent chapel in the Jesuit Church, in New Orleans, in memory of her husband.
ANNE SPALDING.
Was a descendant of the distinguished Spalding family of Morganfield, Kentucky, from which two archbishops have been made. Active in charitable work in Atlanta, Georgia, where her husband, Dr. Robert Spalding, is well known.
SISTER M. IMELDA TERESA (SUSIE TERESA FORREST SWIFT, O. P.)
Was the daughter of George Henry and Pamelia Forrest Paine; was born in 1862; a graduate of Vassar College. Her first philanthropic work was with the Salvation Army. She trained the officers for the organization at the International Training Home, London; established a home for waif boys in London, England, and suggested to General Booth the outline of his work, "Darkest England's Social Scheme"; was the author of many stories and poems written for Salvation Army publications. In 1896 she became a convert to Catholicism, and since has served as assistant editor of the Catholic World Magazine and editor of the Young Catholic. In 1897 she entered a religious order, and was for a time
directress of an orphanage in Havana, Cuba, and directress of the Dominican College of Havana. Since October, 1004, she has served as novice mistress of the Dominican congregation of St. Catherine di Ricci, of Albany, New York. CAROLINE EARLE WHITE
Was born in Philadelphia in 1833. Her father and mother were active opponents of slavery, and he wrote the (new) Constitution of Pennsylvania, and was a candidate for the Vice-Presidency in 1840 on the Anti-Slavery ticket. Mrs. White has devoted nearly her whole life to children and animals. She was one of the women who ably assisted Henry Bergh in the establishment of the Humane Society in New York, and was the founder of the Pennsylvania Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals; also of the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children, of that state; author of "Love in the Tropics," "A Modern Agrippa," "Letters from Spain and Norway," "An Ocean Mystery," and contributor to Harper's Magazine and the Forum; member of the Society of Colonial Dames.
HELEN MILLER GOULD.
Miss Gould was born in New York, June 20, 1868, daughter of the late Jay and Helen Day Gould; sister of George Jay, Edwin, Howard and Frank Jay Gould. She has been identified with philanthropic work for many years; has made many notable gifts, including: Library building, costing $310,000 to University City of New York, $100,000 to United States Government for war purposes, $10,000 to Rutgers College, $10,000 to Engineering School, University City of New York, $50,000 to the naval branch of the Brooklyn Young Men's Christian Association, and numerous other donations for educational and charitable purposes.
Miss Gould is indeed a unique figure—a wealthy woman, born into the New York smart set, she is yet puritanical, conscientious, modest, loyal, conservative, charitable and utterly indifferent to that phase of society which means a laborious career and a heart-burning competition.
Annually she gives in charity tens of thousands of dollars, and with her liberal inclination in this direction it is well that she is a trained business woman (she has had a good course in law) for each year demands come to her for over two million dollars. She has received requests for everything, from her autograph on a blank slip, to her signature on a thousand dollar check. In one week alone she had 1,303 appeals, amounting to $1,500,000.
One of her sweetest charities is the home for poor children at Lyndehurst, and another at Woodycrest, three miles out of Tarrytown, New York, where she cares for twenty-five little ones. To all these benefactions has she given greatly, and then the half has not been told.
MILDRED A. BONHAM.
Mrs. Bonham was born in Magnolia, Illinois, August, 1840. In 1847 her parents removed to Qregon, and in 1858 she married Judge B. F. Bonham, of Salem, Oregon. In 1885 Judge Bonham was made consul-general to British India, and the family removed to Calcutta. Her letters, under the pen name of "Mizpah," had wide circulation in the Oregon and California papers. She did some splendid work among the women of India, and succeeded in raising $1,000 to found a scholarship for these women in one of the schools of this country.
KATHARINE BEMENT DAVIS.
Katharine Bement Davis was born in Buffalo, New York. Her parents were Oscar B. Davis and Frances Bement. They moved to Dunkirk, New York, when she was two years old. She was educated in the Dunkirk public schools, but moved to Rochester, New York, while she was in the high school, and graduated from the Rochester Free Academy. She returned to Dunkirk, New York, as a teacher of chemistry and physics in the high school, and taught there several years before she entered Vassar College, where she graduated in 1892. The year following her graduation she went to New York, where she taught sciences in the Brooklyn Heights Seminary in the morning, and studied chemistry at Columbia University afternoons and Saturdays.
In the spring, summer and fall of 1893 she conducted an experiment under the auspices of the New York State commission for the World's Fair, called "A Workingman's Model Home." The house was built and furnished to illustrate what a workingman could do in New York State, outside of New York City, who was earning $600 a year. Here she had a real family living, and gave demonstrations of the bill of fare which such a family could have.
In the fall of 1893 she went to Philadelphia as head worker in the College Settlement. After four years there she went to the University of Chicago as a fellow in the Department of Political Economy. In 1888-1889 she held the European fellowship of the New England Women's Educational Association, studying in Berlin and Vienna. Returning to this country, she took her doctor's degree at the University of Chicago in the Departments of Political Economy and Sociology in the spring of 1900.
At this time the New York State Reformatory had been incorporated, and was in process of construction. The board of managers, of whom Mrs. Josephine Shaw Lowell, of New York, was one, and whose president is, and was, Mr. James Wood, of Mt. Kisco, were on the lookout for someone to accept the superintendency. They wanted someone who would conduct the institution along new lines, and not one who was institution trained. Through Mrs. Lowell Mrs. Davis became interested in the plan, and in the fall of 1900 accepted the superintendency, and has been in that position ever since.
Mrs. Davis has been a lecturer on penology, particularly as concerns women in the New York School of Philanthropy, since its organization. Happening to be in Sicily on a six-months' leave in the winter of 1908-1909, at the time of the Messina earthquake, she acted as agent for the American Red Cross in Syracuse, Sicily, helping to organize relief work. She received medals, both from the American and Italian Red Cross for this service. At the International Prison Congress, held in Washington in 1910, she was elected to preside over the section on children. It is not customary to elect women to these positions, but it was done on this occasion as a recognition of the important part that American women take in matters of penology.
MARTHA BERRY.
Miss Martha Berry is one of the most prominent women to-day in the philanthropic work in the South, and one who deserves conspicuous mention for her personal efforts and what she has accomplished in her splendid work for the benefit of the children of the mountaineers of Georgia, who are so isolated and so shut out from every opportunity of education. The beginning of the Martha Berry Industrial School, to which only the poor are eligible, was the result of Miss Berry's efforts to interest a few of the mountain children who strayed into a simple cottage which she had built on the mountain side, near her father's home. The Bible stories and tales from Grimm which she told them brought them frequently together. A year later four mountain day schools were established. Through them Miss Berry realized that the only salvation of these mountain children lay in training them in a home school, where strict discipline and industrial training would go hand in hand with book learning. So she built her own school, a ten-room building. Her first two scholars were boys whom she had found in a cabin far out in the hills, boarding themselves and paying two dollars a month tuition to an old broken down schoolmaster who was teaching them the Greek alphabet, though they couldn't read or write. She took these boys under her charge, promising them a literary and industrial education at fifty dollars a year, including their board, with the privilege of working their way through school. This was in January, 1902. The school opened with one building and five pupils, two teachers and about thirty acres of forest land. Their industrial equipment consisted of an old horse, one small plough, two hoes, a rake, two axes and a mallet. To-day Miss Berry's buildings and equipments represent an investment of two hundred thousand dollars. More than a thousand boys have come to this school and gone back to the mountains to help reclaim their people from the ignorance and superstition into which they had fallen. A girls' school has also been established in connection with this, and there are in it fifty girls. Miss Berry has raised thirty-five thousand dollars every year to keep the work going. Hundreds of boys and girls of the mountain districts of Georgia, Tennessee, Alabama and Virginia are pleading to enter this school. Nothing but the lack of a generous support prevents Miss Berry from extending her work in this much-needed field.
ELECTA AMANDA JOHNSON.
Mrs. Electa Amanda Johnson was born in Wayne County, New York, in November, 1838. She was descended from a distinguished Revolutionary family on her father's side, and an old Knickerbocker family on her mother's side. In 1860 she married A. H. Johnson, a lawyer of Prairie du Chien. She was one of the founders of the Wisconsin Industrial School for Girls, and has been selected by the governor of Wisconsin several times to represent the state on the questions of charity and reform.
IRMA THEODA JONES.
Mrs. Irma Theoda Jones was born March II, 1845, in Victory, New York. Mrs. Jones' maiden name was Andrews, and her family were among the early pioneers of western New York, who later removed to Rockford, Illinois. Her work is among women's clubs and the temperance union; she is also a contributor to various newspapers. In 1865 she married Nelson B. Jones, a prominent citizen of Lansing, Michigan. In 1892 she became editor of the Literary Club Department of the Mid-Continent, a monthly magazine published in Lansing.
CORA SCOTT POND.
Was born March 2, 1856, in Cheboygan, Wisconsin. Her father was born in Maine, and her mother in New Brunswick. She was a second cousin, on her father's side, of General Winfield Scott. Her father was a successful inventor of machinery and booms for milling and logging purposes, and one of the early pioneers in Wisconsin. After her graduation from the state university she taught music, and at this time became interested in the woman's suffrage and temperance movements, and was invited by Mrs. Lucy Stone to help organize the state for woman's suffrage. Although intending to teach, she took upon herself this work, and organized eighty-seven woman's leagues in Massachusetts, speaking in public and raising money to carry on the work in that state for over six years. In 1887 she organized a woman's suffrage bazaar, and raised over six thousand dollars. While teaching in the Conservatory of Music in Boston she contributed sketches of Shakespeare, Dickens and other authors. She originated a dramatic entertainment called the National Pageant, which she gave with great success for the benefit of the various societies of women in Massachusetts. She was intimately associated with Mary A. Livermore, and aided and assisted her in her Boston work. Mrs. Pope traveled through the country, giving the National Pageant for local societies, and raised many thousands of dollars for charitable purposes. In Chicago, in one night's performance, given in the Auditorium, sixty thousand dollars were cleared. While here she met and married John T. Pope, who assisted her in her work.
MARGARET CHANLER.
The philanthropy of Miss Chanler has been almost equal to that of Miss Gould, and she has strewn with a lavish hand many blessings upon the poor and needy. During the Cuban War she volunteered as a nurse to the soldiers, serving faithfully in that inhospitable climate. She has been very modest in the manner in which she has disbursed many thousands of dollars for the comfort and salvation of the indigent of New York City and elsewhere. Her charity is broad and enters many avenues.
ELIZA GARRETT.
The name of Eliza Garrett will ever be remembered with gratitude by Biblical students and the Methodist Church throughout the world. Her original name was Eliza Clark, and she was born near Newburg, New York, March 5, 1805. In 1825 she married Augustus Garrett. Their early married life was filled with frequent change, they having made their home in New York City, Cincinnati, New Orleans and Mississippi. While on their voyage down the Mississippi River they lost a daughter with cholera; later, they lost a son, their only surviving child.
In 1834 Mr. Garrett moved to Chicago, and became one of the prominent men and early pioneers of that city. After Chicago became a city Mr. Garrrett was elected mayor. In December, 1848, his death occurred. Mrs. Garrett became possessed of one-half the entire estate. Of a strong religious faith, her influence was always exerted for a Christian life and Christian principles. She was always benevolent, and now decided to carry out her desires to aid in some educational enterprise. She believed the future of the church and country demanded a thorough intellectual training for the young under the auspices of Christianity. She realized that ministerial education was by no means receiving a corresponding share of attention, and that for various reasons it was not likely soon to be provided for in the ordinary way. To this, therefore, she directed her thoughts. She saw in her own church (Methodist) a growing denomination of Christians, then numbering seven hundred thousand communicants, and requiring for its ordinary pastoral care not less than five thousand ministers, while the claims made upon it for missionaries throughout the United States and distant lands were unlimited. Besides, it was lamentably true that many who were engaged in ministerial work left it prematurely, unable, with an imperfect preparation, to bear up under its weighty responsibilities. The want of an institution which should provide for ministerial students ample libraries and all appropriate apparatus of thorough and extended study, in which teachers of ability and experience would be ever ready to welcome, guide and instruct those desiring to profit for such opportunities, was badly felt. After due reflection and investigation, Mrs. Garrett decided to found such an institution. Her will, executed December, 1853, gave, after some personal legacies, more than one-third of her estate—"all the rest and residue—that is to say, the rents, issues, profits and proceeds thereof," to the erection, furnishing and endowment of a "theological institution for the Methodist Episcopal Church, to be called the Garrett Biblical Institute." Said institution was to be located in or near Chicago, and was to be perpetually under the guardianship of the church.
This will, also, with a wise reference to the distant future, contained this proviso: "In case at any time the said trust property, the rents, issues and proceeds thereof, shall exceed the amount necessary to build, fit, furnish, endow and support said Biblical institute as aforesaid, I direct and devote the surplus to accumulate, or otherwise to be invested for accumulation, for the erection within the city of Chicago, or its* vicinity, of a female college, as soon as my said executors, the survivors or survivor of them, or the trustees of said trust property, as herein provided, shall deem the same adequate therefor; the said female college to be under the same control and government, and the trustees to be elected in the same manner, and to possess the same qualifications as are provided for said Biblical institute."
At the time when Mrs. Garrett's will was executed, it was not supposed by herself or her friends that the benevolent designs she contemplated could be accomplished from the avails of her estate for some years to come. Her property had been rendered, by fires, mostly unproductive, while it was to some extent incumbered with debts. At this point a fact should be stated most honorable to her name and highly illustrative of her Christian self-denial. So anxious was Mrs. Garrett to disincumber her estate of its liabilities at the earliest possible period and make it available to carry out her pious and benevolent designs that, for several years, she would only accept four hundred dollars per annum for her support, and nearly half of that she devoted to religious uses. There are probably few who would have been as self-denying under such circumstances. The providence of God did not allow designs so wise and so essential to the welfare of His Church to remain long undeveloped. The friends of the Church became interested to have the measure proposed carried into operation at the earliest moment possible. A beautiful site had just been selected for the Northwestern University on the shore of Lake Michigan, twelve miles north of Chicago, and it was resolved to erect at the same place a temporary building for the Biblical institute. Through the agency of the Rev. P. Judson, the building was promptly constructed; so that in January, 1855, a temporary organization of the institute was effected, under charge of the Rev. Dr. Dempster. It was arranged that this organization should be supported independent of the estate for a period of five years. Meantime, a charter for the permanent institution was secured from the legislature of the state :n full accordance with Mrs. Garrett's wishes.
In the autumn of 1855, from a state of perfect health, Mrs. Garrett was stricken down with mortal disease, and after a few days of suffering was called to her reward on high. On Sunday evening, the 18th of November, she was in her place at church, and on Thursday, the 22d, she died.
"Only a few years have passed away since the death of Mrs. Garrrett, and already the seed planted by her hand is producing fruit — an earnest of a glorious and endless harvest. The institution which her liberality endowed, and which, it was feared, might have to struggle for a time with opposition and prejudice, was only a few months after her decease formally accepted and sanctioned by the general conference, the highest judicatory of the Church. The Bishops, the highest officers of the Church, were apppointed a board of council for the institution, and under their advice it has been permanently organized. It is now in efficient operation, and has already given the earnest of widespread and continued usefulness in the Church."
MME. SLAVKO GROUITCH.
Mme. Grouitch, wife of the Servian Charge d'Affaires at the Court of St. James, London, England, was formerly Miss Mabel Gordon Dunlop of West Virginia, whose father was a prominent railroad man of the early days in Virginia and later in Chicago, Illinois. Mme. Grouitch when quite a young girl became interested in the study of archaeology and ethnology, to which her father was greatly devoted. After studying at the Chicago University for several years, she went to Athens to revel in the ruins and collections of Greece. While a student in Athens she met her husband, a member of a distinguished family of Servia, who was at that time Attache of the Servian Legation in Paris, where their marriage occurred. Since her marriage Mme. Grouitch has devoted herself to the work of up-lifting the women of Servia. The University at Belgrade admits girls, but in Servia a girl may not go away from home or into the street unchaperoned, and it is for these girls and to teach the girls of the people scientific culture and domestic arts that Mme. Grouitch and certain noble women of Belgrade determined to found a boarding school in the city of Belgrade. The wives of the representatives of the Servian Government at the various courts of Europe are helping Mme. Grouitch to raise the money for this work. Mme. Grouitch's niece was educated in Belgrade and went from that University to England and took high rank in mathematics, met the senior wrangler at Oxford and vanquished him. Mme. Grouitch is particularly anxious to establish an agricultural course for girls in connection with the University of Belgrade, for the reason, as she says, often where a son cannot be spared to go and study agriculture, because the sons must enter the army, a daughter could be spared and then return to her home and teach the family what she had learned. Among the Servian peasants the women work with the men in the fields. Servian land has great possibilities. Tobacco, for instance, is so fine that Egypt takes Servia's entire output but the farming methods are very primitive. Another thing which these women plan to do is to re-awaken interest in the national needle work. Everybody knows the wonderful embroidery for which Servian women have always been noted, but in the last thirty years Servia has been flooded with cheap things from other countries and art has declined. Mme. Grouitch says the Servians are the cleanest people she has ever known; nothing can be taught them as to housework and sanitation. Eighty girls from the provinces are now studying in Belgrade and boarding at this home established by Mme. Grouitch and her associates. The Servian Government has given the land for the school and the building is under construction. Mme. Grouitch has raised a large sum of money from her friends in this country. She is a gifted, cultured and charming woman, one in which America can feel a pride at having her represent her country in the various parts of Europe to which her husband's official positions may call him.
JANE LATHROP STANFORD.
Philanthropist and Social Leader.
Mrs. Jane Lathrop Stanford was born in Albany, New York, August 25, 1825. Mrs. Stanford is well known as the wife of Leland Stanford, of California. During the early years of Mr. Stanford's struggle and varying fortunes, she proved herself a worthy helpmeet and is one of the type of American women produced by the early days of California's mining history. Mrs. Stanford's public career commenced when Mr. Stanford was elected governor of California in 1861. Mr. Stanford occupied different positions of prominence and was finally elected United States Senator from his state, California. After the death of their only child, Leland Stanford, Jr., Mrs. Stanford and her husband erected to the memory of this boy the university which bears his name. The "Leland Stanford, Jr., University"—at Palo Alto, their country seat, situated about thirty miles from San Francisco. Not a building of this great university was erected without Mrs. Stanford's advice and wishes being consulted. She erected at her own individual expense a museum which contained works of art and a most valuable collection of curios gathered during their tours in foreign lands. Much of this was lost at the time of the great earthquake a few years ago.
The entire estate of Mr. Stanford and that of his wife at her death were left to endow this great university. Mrs. Stanford was a generous friend to the many charitable institutions of San Francisco. Though a woman of such strong personality, she had one of the tenderest hearts and the deepest sympathy for those in trouble. To such women the Pacific coast owes much of its development and growth. Mrs. Stanford's death occurred in 1905.
MRS. M. A. HUNTER.
Mrs. M. A. Hunter, widow of Commodore Hunter of the navy, founded the first home for orphans in the state of Louisiana, and perhaps in the South. In 1817 a vessel loaded with emigrants arrived at New Orleans, who were fatherless and motherless owing to the loss of their parents by cholera during the voyage. Mrs. Hunter was then a prominent social leader, but a most charitable, sympathetic woman. She gathered these poor little orphans into her own home until a place could be found for them. A wealthy merchant and planter offered a temporary home and took upon himself the work of erecting a suitable building as an asylum for orphan children, but it was through the interest aroused by Mrs. Hunter and her efforts in this work that the institution exists to-day.
D. A. MILIKEN.
Mrs. D. A. Miliken, of New Orleans, founded a memorial hospital for white children at the cost of $150,000, in memory of her husband, and left it handsomely endowed.
WILLIE FRANKLIN PRUIT.
Born in Tennessee in 1865. Her parents' name was Franklin, and they moved to Texas at the close of the Civil War. She is prominent in the city of Fort Worth, Texas. Most of her poems have been published under the pen name of "Aylmer Ney." In 1887 she married Drew Pruit, a lawyer of Fort Worth; has been engaged in many public and charitable enterprises for civic betterment. Vice-president of the Woman's Humane Association of Fort Worth and through her efforts a number of handsome drinking fountains were placed about the city for the benefit of man and beast.
MARY ELIZABETH BLANCHARD LYNDE.
SARAH ANN MATHER.
Was born March 20, 1820, in Chester, Massachusetts. She was the wife of Rev. James Mather, and of Puritan ancestry. She was at one time principal of the Ladies' Department and professor of modern languages in Western University, Leoni, Michigan. After the close of the war and before the United States troops were withdrawn from the South, she went among the freedmen as a missionary and brought to bear all her powers upon this work, sacrificing her health and investing all of her available means in the work of establishing a normal and training school for the colored youth in Camden, South Carolina. Her interest in this work brought about the necessity of her becoming a public speaker in order to arouse the interest of others. She organized the Woman's Home Missionary Society of the Methodist Episcopal Church, and through her efforts a model home and training school was established in Camden, South Carolina, and the school is sustained by this society. She is the author of several works, among them "Young Life," "A Hidden Treasure" and "Little Jack Fee!"
MRS. RUSSELL SAGE.
Mrs. Sage, before her marriage to Russell Sage, on November 24, 1869, at Watervliet, New York, was Miss Margaret Olivia Slocum. She was born in Syracuse, N. Y., September 8, 1828, and was the daughter of Joseph and Margaret Pierson Jermain Slocum. Mrs. Sage has always devoted her life and means to charity. She has never had any inclination or taken any part in the social life of New York, preferring to do her part toward the cause of humanity. She was president of the Emma Willard Association; is a member of the Society of Mayflower descendants and Colonial Dames. Since the death of her husband, in 1906, she has given one million dollars to the Emma Willard Seminary, of Troy, N. Y.; one million to Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute; $115,000 to a public school at Sag Harbor, L. I.; ten millions to be known as the Sage Foundation for Social Betterment; $350,000 to the Y. M. C. A. of New York; $150,000 to American Seamen's Friend Society; $150,000 to Northfield (Massachusetts) Seminary; $300,000 to Sage Institute of Pathology of City Hospital on Blackwell's Isand; $250,000 to a home for Indigent Women; $100,000 to Syracuse University. These represent only her public gifts, while her private and individual charities and gifts to relatives and friends are manifold.
The purposes of the Sage Foundation Fund are broad and generous and will be of lasting benefit to the men and women of to-day and to those of the future in the work of uplifting the unfortunate and aiding helpful men and women to do their part in the work of the human race in the building of our nation. The Russell Sage Foundation was incorporated under the laws of the slate of New York in the month of April, 1907. The endowment consists of the sum of $10,000 donated by Mrs. Russell Sage. The purpose of the Foundation, as stated in its charter, is "the improvement of social and living conditions in the United States of America." The charter further provides that "It shall be within the purpose of said corporation to use any means which, from time to time, shall seem expedient to its members or trustees, including research, publication, education, the establishment and maintenance of charitable and benevolent activities, agencies and institutions, and the aid of any such activities, agencies or institutions already established."
In a letter addressed to the trustees in April, 1907, Mrs. Sage further defines the scope of the Foundation and its limitations as follows: "The scope of the Foundation is not only national, but it is broad. It should, however, preferably, not undertake to do that which is now being done or is likely to be effectively done by other individuals or other agencies. It should be its aim to take up the larger, more difficult problems, and to take them up so far as possible in such a manner as to secure co-operation and aid in their solution."
Among the other activities to which the Russell Sage Foundation has contributed financial aid are the National Red Cross, the President's Homes Commission and the Child-Saving Congress in Washington. Some idea of the scope of the Foun dation's activities may be gained from the following titles of a few of its publications:
The Standard of Living Among Workingmen's Families in New York City.
Medical Inspection of Schools.
Laggards in Our Schools.
Correction and Prevention. Four volumes.
Juvenile Court Laws in the United States : Summarized.
The Pittsburgh Survey. Six volumes.
Housing Reform.
A Model Tenement House Law.
Among School Gardens.
Workingmen's Insurance in Europe.
The Campaign Against Tuberculosis in the United States.
Report on the Desirability of Establishing an Employment
Bureau in the city of New York.
Wider Use of the School Plant.
The above statement of some of the activities of the Foundation is not inclusive or complete, nor is it intended to be. It is only illustrative. The Foundation has never published a complete report of all of its activities.
GEORGIA MARQUIS NEVINS.