Representative women of New England/Marie W. Laughton
MARIE WARE LAUGHTON was born in Lewiston, Me., at the home of her parents, Warren Preston and Elizabeth Foss (Prentiss) Laughton. Her paternal grandparents were John and Amata (Greenleaf) Laughton. Another John Laughton, her ancestor of an earlier generation, was a minute-man in the Revolution. Through her grandmother Amata, daughter of Joshua Greenleaf, Miss Laughton traces her ancestry back to Edmund Greenleaf (believed to have been of Huguenot stock), who settled in Newbury, Mass., in 1635. Her line, like the poet John Greenleaf Whittier's, continued through Etlmund's son Stephen, who married Elizabeth, daughter of Tristram Coffin.
Miss Laughton's maternal grandparents were Philo and Matilda (Foss) Prentiss. Her great- grandfather, Valentine Prentiss, served as Sergeant in the Revolutionary army. After the war he removed from Woodbury, Conn., to China, Me. He was a lineal descendant of Valentine Prentise, who joined the church in Roxbury in 1632.
Marie Ware Laughton, after her graduation from the Lewiston High School, attended the Normal Practice School in that city, from which she received her teacher'.? diploma in 1881. She then taught for six years in the Lewiston public schools. During the latter part of this time she took up the study of elocution. In the following year she was granted leave of absence to attend the Boston School of Oratory, where she was graduated in 1888. She has studied extensively with the best specialists in the country.
After continuing her work of teaching in Maine for several years, she came to Boston to teach in the Boston College of Oratory, and in 1896 she founded the School of English Speech and Expression, of which she is principal. The aim of this school is to give instruction in higher English and in the art of expression. Its marked success proves that public speakers, readers, and teachers of reading and elocution in public schools and colleges appreciate a school conducted by teachers who present sound methods. The school also meets the need of many who have no thought of entering a profession, but who realize the value of training for the development of power and for the opening up of new and enduring fields of culture.
Miss Laughton has been identified with several clubs and with the Daughters of the American Revolution, being the first woman in Massachusetts to hold the office of State Vice-Regent of the Society. She is the founder and is now Regent of the Committee of Safety Chapter, D. A. R., of Boston.