A woman of the century : fourteen hundred-seventy biographical sketches accompanied by portraits of leading American women in all walks of life

Preface

Amoni;- all cyclopctdias and Ijouks about famous vvome;n, this is intended to be unique and to suppl)' a vacant niche in the reference library. The nineteenth century is woman's century. Since time be^-an, no other era has witnessed so many and so great chang-es in the development of her character and ^ifts and in the multiplication of opportunities for their application. E\'en to those best informed on this subject, we believe that a glance at these pages will bring astonishment at the vast array of woman's achievements here chronicled, in hundreds of new vocations and avocations. Few eminent names and faces will here be missed, while many worthy names, which can not be found elsewhere, are strung upon this rosary of nineteenth-century achievement. Every department of life and work is here represented. One branch oi philanthropic work, that of the missionary, is less numerously represented than its importance deserves, onl)' because an adequate showing would require the addition of nearly every missionary societ)- in our country since missionary societies began to be. This book is not alone a book of record of famous names, but one which aims to show what women have done in the humbler as in the higher walks of life. It is a record of American women offered, at the close of four centuries of life in the New World, to the consideration of those who would know what the nineteenth century of Christian civilization has here brought forth, and what are the vast outlook and the marvelous promise of the twentieth century.

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A

WOMAN OF THE CENTURY.

ABBATT, Miss Agnes Dean, artist, born in Xeu York Cit\ , :!3rd June, 1S47. She still resides in her native city. Her paternal ancestors were English, and she is of French Huguenot descent on her mother's side. Her gTeat-gr.indl'ather and his tamily came from England to this country in tlie latter part of the last century. They settled in what is itow Pleasant \'alley, Dutchess county, X.Y., where William D. Abbatt, the father of Agnes, was bom. He passed his life in business in Poughkeepsie, Philadelphia and New York. Miss Abbatt's grandmother, Mrs. Dean, an English woman, was an art amateur of unusual talent and accomplishments. Of her children, nearly all possessed the talent for painting, but of all the descendants Agues alone has adopted art as a protession. She showed in early childhciod a marked talent for drawing, but it was not till 1S73 t^s-t she took up the study of art as a profession. In that year she entered' the Cooper Union art-school. She won a medal for a headofAjax in the hrst year of her studies, and on the merit of that achievement she was admitted to the art-school of the National Academy oi Design in Xew Y'ork. So decided was her progress that, at the end of the lirst year in that insdtution her first full-length drawing wiis one ot those selected for exhibition. As it w;\s not her intention to become a figure-painter, she left die Academ\- and devoted herself to the study of landscape paindng. That branch of art she studied for several \ears under R. Swain Gifford, X.

A., and lames D. Smillie, X. A., constandy showing new powers and making rapid progress. At the s.une time she was grauf\- ing her tastes in anotlier direction, and she won disnncuon as a water-colorist and also as a tlowerpainter. Her first pictures, tvvo panels ot flowers, were shown in the e-xhibirion of the Brooklyn Art Club in 1S75. where they attracted much attention and found purchasers. Her next picture, "Mv Xe.xt Xeighbor, " was shown in Xew York, and was the subject of much favorable comment. In the Water Color Sociefx's exhibition, in iSSo, she show ed a composition named, " When Autumn Tunis the Leaves," which was one of the most conspicuous features of the exhibition. In the same vcar Miss Abbatt was elected a member of the Ainerican Water Color Society, at once taking high r.mk in that somewhat exclusive organization ofartists. She is the second woman on its hst ot members. She has gi\en especial attention to the painting ot chrysanthemums. Besides the picture enrided "When Autumn Turns the Leaves," she has painted others that are noteworthy, among which are " The Last of the Flowers." " Flowers of the Frost." '' Our Japanese Cousins," " From the Land of the Mikado," "Autumn Colors," and "A Japanese Embassv." all devoted to the royal chr\'santhemuni. In the landscape held she has confined her work mostly to the rural scenes in Westchester, county, X. Y., the picturesque nooks of the eastern end of Long Island, and the co.tst of .Maine and .Massachusetts Bay. Among her notable productions in landscape are " Xear Barnstable, Cape Cod," "The Xoisy Geese th.tt Gabbled o'er the Pool." "A Summer Afternoon on the New England Coast," and "In Lobster Lane, Magnolia, Mass." The last named picture won for her a silver medal in the exhibition of the Charitable Mechanics' and Tradesmen's

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.\GNES DE.\N ABB.\TT.

Association of Boston, Mass. She works with equal facility and success in oil and water colors, and she has also made a study of pastel work. In addition to her own extended creari\e work, she has been a successful art-teacher, in studio and in field. Aside from her home studio, she has taught classes in Washington, D. C. Troy, X. Y., and in Xew Haven, Conn., while her Iield" instruction has been given in X'ew Y'ork, Massachusetts and Maine. She is a genuine enthusiast in art, both as creator and instructor, and in these two

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fields, calling for so widely diftering powers, she has been etiually at home. Her work is distinct in character, in oudme and tone in shades and lights, and her prond position among the painters of the United States is a one legitimately won and successfully held.

ABBOTT, Mrs. :Elizabeth Robinson, educator, born in Lowell, Mass., nth September, 1852. Her maiden name was Elizabeth Osborne Robmson. She is the youngest daughter of William S. and Harriet H. Robinson. Through the writings and conversations of Miss Elizabeth P. Peabody she became interested, in her girlhood, in the kindergarten method of teaching, and would gladly have taken np that branch of educational work at the time when the death of her father made it necessary for her to become self-supporting. But circumstances prevented, and she therefore sought other vvavs of earning her living. Successively, she taua-ht a' district school in Maine and "boarded eliz-\kp;th rorinson .\biiott

round," kept a little private schonl of her own, tried bookkeeping and learned to set type. After giving three months to learning type-setting, she hardly earned enough to pay her board out of the low wages given to women compositors. About that time two positions were open to her, one to "'tend store" and the other as " second assistant " in Mrs. .Shaw's charity kindergarten and nursery at the North End in Boston. The latter position meant simply to be the kitchen-maid or cook, and nothing more; but, preferring this position to that of shop-girl, and tliinking it miglit e\'entually lead or open the way into higher kindergarten work, she accepted the offer. While there. Miss Pluebe Adam, the manager, became interested in the "second assistant" and, knowing her desire to become a kindergartner, with money helped her to carry on her studies, and kindly allowed her the privilege of taking time for her lessons out of the afternoon hours of her work. She was one of the early pupils of Miss Lucy H. Symonds, of Boston, and was a graduate of the class of 1S83. So, after waiting seven years for the fulfillment of her cherished desires, Mrs. Abbott began her work as a kindergartner. Her first teaching was done m a summed charity-school in Boston. She then went to Waterbury, Conn., and introduced this method into the Hillside Avenue school. There she taught until her marriage, in 18S5, to George S. Abbott, of that city. After her marriage Mrs. Abbott did not lose her interest in kindergarten work, but continued her class until most of her little pupils were graduated into primary schools. Since that time she has encouraged and helped others to keep up the work she so successfully began, having for two years given part of her home for use as a kindergarten Thus Mrs. Abbott has created and maintained in the city where she now lives a lasting interest, and she may be considered a pioneer of kindergarten work in Connecticut She is now secretary'of the Connecticut X'alley Kindergarten Association, an association of kindergartners embracing western INIassachusetts. Connecticut and Rhode Island. Mrs. Abbott is not well known as a writer or speaker, but she is interested in and works for all that relates to the ad\'ancement of women. She is chairman of the correspondence committee for Connecticut of the General Federation of Women's Clubs, one of the founders of Old and New. the woman's club of Maiden. Mass., and the chief founder of the Woman's Club of Waterburv. Conn.

ABBOTT, ;Enima, prima donna, born in Chicago, ill-, in 1S50. Herlather was a music teacher, and he encouraged her and her brother George to develop the musical talents that each showed at a very early age. Emma was a singing child, and under her father's training she sang well and became a proficient performer on the guitar. Professor Abbott moved from Chicago to Peoria, 111., in 1S54. There his patronage was so small that his family was in straitened circumstances. He gave a concert in 1S59, i" which the young Emma was prima donna and guitar player, and her brother was her support. The entertainment was a success, and Professor Abbott and his two talented children gave a large number of concerts in other towns and cities, with varying fortunes. In 1 866 the finances of the family were at a low ebb, and Emma took a district school to teach in order to assist in supporting the household. Emma's early lessons on the guitar and her brother's on the violin were not entirely paid foruntil she had become a successful concertsingcrin New York. Atthe age of thirteen she taught the guitar with success. Her education was acquired in the Peoria public schools. When she was sixteen years old she sang in the synagogue in Peoria. At that age she joined the Lombard Concert Company, of Chicago, and tra\eled w ith them in Iowa, Illinois, and Wisconsin. When the company disbanded Emma found herself in Grand Haven, Mich., friendless and moneyless. With her guitar she started out alone and gave concerts in Michigan and the neighboring States, and thus worked her way to New York City, where she gave parlor concerts in the hotels in which she staid, and in that way earned the money for her expenses. Failing to gain notice in New York, she borrowed money and returned to the west. She tried a concert season in Chicago and Milwaukee, but was unsuccessful. She then tried a number of smaller towns and ended her tour in a failure in a hotel in Toledo, Ohio. Among her hearers in that slimly attended concert was Clara Louise Kellogg, who recognized her merit and gave her money enough to go to New York, with a letter to

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Professor Errani. In 1870 she began to study with pany, her gifts to charity, and her industry and him, and was engaged to sing in Dr. Chapin's church at a salary of |i,5oo a year. In 1S72 Mr. Lake, with the aid of Dr. Chapin's congregation, perseverance at length won over the critics, who had simply made manifest their inability to write down a really meritorious artist. Miss Abbott sang throughout the United States, and in an incredibly short time she had amassed a fortune of several millions of dollars. Her voice was a pure, clear, long-range soprano of great flexibility. Her n'jles included Norma, Semiramide, Elvira, Martha, Lucia, and Marguerite, and in her last years she appeared in costumes more magnificent than any other singer had ever worn. She died in Ogden, Utah, 4th January, 1891, after an illness of less than a week. Her funeral was held in Chicago on 9th January, her body was cremated, in accordance with a provision of her will, and its ashes were deposited in the magnificent mausoleum she had built in Gloucester, Mass. Her large fortune was divided by her will among her relatives and friends, and various churches and charitable societies.

ACHi^SON, Mrs. Sarah C, temperance worker, born in Wasliington, Pa., 20th February, 1844. .She is descended on the paternal side from English and Dutch families that settled in Virginia in 1600, and on the maternal side from Col. George Morgan, who had charge of Indian afiairs under Washington, with headquarters at Fort Pitt, and of whom Jefl^erson, in a letter which Mrs. Acheson has in her possession, says, "He first gave me notice of the mad project of that day," meaning the Aaron Burr treason. Among her ancestors were Col. William Duane, of Philadelphia, editor of the Philadelphia "Aurora" during the Revolution. Her girlhood was spent in the town of her birth, where she was married, in 1S63, to Capt.

raised ifio.ooo to send her to Europe for musical training. She went to Milan and studied with San Giovanni, and afterwards to Paris, where she studied under Wartel for several years. She studied with Delle Sadie also. While in Paris, she sufl'ered an illness that threatened the destruction of her voice. She made a successful debut, however, and she had there a warm friend in the Baroness Rothschild. Numerous enticing offers were made to her by European managers. She made an engagement with Manager Gye in London, but refused, on moral grounds, to appear in the opera, " La Traviata." In this she was supported by Eugene Wetherell, her husband. He was a member of Dr. Chapin's church and had followed her to Europe, where they were secretly married. Her refusal to sing that role ended in the cancellation of her engagement with Mr. Gye. In 1876 she returned to the United States, and with C. D. Hess organized an opera company. She appeared in the Park Theater, Brooklyn, N. Y., in her famous role of Marguerite. Soon after she became her own manager, and her husband and Charles Pratt attended to her business until Mr. Wetherell's sudden death in Denver, Col., in 1888. Miss Abbott, for she always retained her maiden name, was successful from the start. In spite of abuse, ridicule and misrepresentation, she drew large audiences wherever she appeared. The critics at first derided her in every possible way, but the public did not heed the critics and crowded to hear the

courageous little woman who could maintain her , „ ^ a^-i •

jrood temper under a shower of ridicule, the like of Acheson, of the same place, then on Gen. Miles s which never before fell upon the head of a public staff, the marriage taking p ace while the Captain personage. She grew artistically every year, and was on furlough with a gunshot wound in the face, her stainless character, her generosity to her com- "" '"''*

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SARAH C. ACHESON.

He left for the front ten days after, encouraged by

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his young wife. Dr and Mrs. Acheson moved to Texas in 1872. During their residence in Texas INIrs. Acheson has been a moral force. Her influence has been strongly felt, not only in the city where she resides, but throughout the State. Her generous nature has been shown in heroic deeds of a kind which the world seldom sees. When a cyclone struck the village of Savoy, many of its inhabitants were badly wounded, some were killed, others made homeless. I\Irs. Acheson reached them as speedily as a train could take her, doing duty as nurse and special provider for the suffering. She gave three years of active service to the Woman's Christian Temperance Union. She was State president at a time when a strong leafier was greatly needed, guiding their bark into a haven of financial safety. " Her life is active along all lines of duty. She is abreast of the advanced thought of the age. The world's progress in social, scientific and religious reform is not only an open, but a well-read book, to her. Her home is in Denison, Tex. ACKERM ANN, Miss Jessie A. , president of the Woman's Christian Temperance Union of Australasia, born in Boston, Mass., 4th July, i860. As befits a Fourth-of-July child, she has the ring of American independence. She is a descendant of the Pilgrim Fathers on her mother's side, and is of German extraction on her father's. Her inherited virtues and talents have been developed by liberal educational advantages. She was instructed in law, and spent much time in the study of elocution.

She took a private course of study in theology, while drawing and painting and instruction in household matters were not neglected. She had the advantage of extensive travel through her native land and spent much time in the Southern States, immediately after the close of her schooldays. At twelve years of age she was taken to a Good Templars' Lodge, where she received her first temperance teaching, and gave her first temperance talk. She began public work as grand lecturer and organizer for that society in 1881, and continued until, in 1888, the wider scope and higher spiritual tone of the Woman's Christian Temperance Union, with its special opportunities for work among women, won her heart, and she began to serve in its ranks. She succeeded amid extraordinary difficulties in organizing unions at Sitka and Juneau, in Alaska She also traveled and organizeci in British Columbia with success. She gladly responded to the call to go round the world, and receiving her appointment at the National Convention held in New York, in October, 1888, she sailed from San Francisco for the Sandwich Islands on 29th January, 1889. She reached Honolulu on 6th February, and was cordially welcomed at the residence of the W. C. T. U. president. The Japanese Consul-General, a cultivated Christian gentleman, president of a temperance society of 1,400 members, was much interested in her work and acted as interpreter at the meetings she held among the Japanese residents, the other foreigners and the native Hawaiians. She spent some time in the Islands. The history of her mission in New Zealand and the Australian colonies was recorded in the " Union Signal" by her letters during 1889. Successful and enthusiastic missions were held in the North and South Islands of New Zealand and in the Island of Tasmania. She visited Melbourne on the way for Adelaide. She remained two months in South Australia, traveled over the greater part of the colony, oiganized twenty-four local unions, called a convention in Adelaide, formed a Colonial Union, and left a membership of 1,126. Workers responded to her call in every place, and money was forthcoming for all needs, Finding the work in Victoria well

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organized under the care of Mrs. Love, of America, she stayed only a few days, in which she spoke in the crowded meetings of the Victorian- Alliance, which is very influential in Melbourne. Her stay in New South Wales was very brief, for she found that outside help was not at that time welcomed in that oldest and most conservative colony, although a good work was doing by the several local unions. She was most cordially welcomed to Queensland, but stayed only long enough to attend their annual convention, as the way to China and Japan seemed open before her. A sense of duty rather than inclination took Miss Ackermann to China, but from the time she landed in Hong Kong she was well received everywhere. As there seemed no opportunity to organize in Hong Kong, she decided to proceed to Siam, by way of Swatow. Her visit to Bankok was prolonged through an attack of malarial fever, which greatly reduced her strength. While in that city, she obtained an

JESSIE A. ACKERMANN.

audience with His Royal Highness, Prince Diss, who is at the head of the department of education in Siam. She was also presented to His Majesty, the King of Siam, who received her graciously. She returned again to Hong Kong, on the way to Canton, which she reached by river. The northern ports of China being closed, Miss Ackermann proceeded to Japan, going to Yokohama. There she did much work and formed a union. She next visited Tokio. A very successful mission was held at Numadza, where a union of forty members was formed. Meetings were held in Nagoya, and also under the auspices of the temperance society in Kioto, where Miss Ackermann addressed the Congregational Conference, then in session. There she also spoke in the theater to six hundred Buddhist students, on " What Christianity has done for the World." She addressed nine hundred students in the Doshisha school. Osaka was visited at the invitation of the Young Men's Christian

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Association. Returning: to Shanghai, she enjoyed the privilege of attending and making an address before the General Missionary Conference of China. The last was held thirteen years earlier. At that time a woman was called upon to bring her work before the conference, at which the chairman vacated the chair, and many left the meeting in sore grief and indignation. On this occasion, however, all women delegates present, including missionaries' wives, Were made voting members of the conference with all the privileges of the floor, amid Storms of applause. Miss Ackermann was able to form a National Woman's Christian Temperance Union for China. Successful missions were conducted in Cooktown, Townsville, Mount Morgan, Rockhampton and Brisbane, and she again went into New South Wales. The work was very hard. In the first month she traveled seven-hundred miles, held forty-two meetings, and made more than one-hundred calls in search of leaders for the work. The results were gratifying, being twenty new unions, a reorganized Colonial Union, and fifteen Colonial superintendents. The Good Templars were her faithful friends in that colony, and she spoke in the annual meetings of the Grand Lodge, where about three-hundred delegates were present. She called a convention in Melbourne for May, 1891, which was attended by forty-nine delegates. Miss Ackermann was elected president. A constitution was adopted providing for a triennial convention, the next to be held in Sydney in 1S94, and Miss Ackermann was elected president of the Woman's Christian Temperance Union of Australasia for the ensuing term of three years. Since October, 1S88, she has traveled more than forty-thousand miles, spoken through interpreters in seventeen dift'crent languages, formed more than one-hundred unions, taken five thousand pledges, and received over four thousand women into the union. The suppression of the opium traffic and of gambling, and the religious education of the young are questions to which she is devoting much thought. Since the Australasian convention she has traveled and organized in Victoria and South Australia. Miss Ackermann writes modestly of her platform ability, but she is really a speaker of no mean order. Her audiences are held by her addresses and fascinated by her lectures.

ADAMS, Mrs. Abigail, wife of John Adams, second President of the United States, born 22nd November, 1744, in Weymouth, Mass. She was a daughter of the Rev. William Smith, for forty years minister of the Congregational church in Weymouth. Her mother was Elizabeth Quincy, a great-great-granddaughter of Rev. Thomas Shepard, an eminent Puritan clergyman of Cambridge, and a great-grandnieceof the Rev. John Norton, of Boston. Abigail Adams was one of the most distinguished women of the Revolutionary period. She was indelicate health in youth and unable to attend school, but she became a far better scholar than most of the women of her day. She read widely and wrote in terse, vigorous and elegant language. Her youth was passed in converse with persons of learning, experience and political sagacity. She was married on 25th October, 1764, to John Adams, then a young lawyer practicing in Boston. During the next ten years her quiet and happy life was devoted to her husband and her four children, three sons and one daughter. Then came the troubled times that were marked by the disputes between the Colonies and England. Mrs. Adams seconded her husband in his opposition to the English oppression, and encouraged him in his zeal and determination in urging the Colonies to declare their independence. She remained in Braintree,

Mass., while Mr. Adams was absent as a delegate to the Continental Congress and afterwards on diplomatic missions in Europe. In 1784 she joined her husband in France, and in 1785 they went to London, whither Mr. Adams was sent as Minister Plenipotentiary to the Court of Great Britain. Remembering the patriotic zeal and independence of Mrs. Adams during the Revolution, George III and his queen, still smarting over the loss of the American Colonies, treated her with marked rudeness. Mrs. Adams remembered their rudeness, and afterwards wrote: " Hunfiliation for Charlotte is no sorrow for me" After spending one year in France and three in England, Mrs. Adams returned to the United States in 1788. In 1789, after her husband was appointed Vice-President of the United States, she went to reside in Philadelphia, Pa., then the seat of government. In 1797 Mr. Adams was chosen President. In 1800, after his defeat, they retired to Ouincy, Mass., where Mrs.

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Adams died 28th October, 1S18. .She was a woman of elevated mind and strong powers of judgment and observation. Her letters have been collected and published with a biographical sketch by her grandson, Charles F. Adams, in a volume entitled " Familiar Letters of John Adams and his Wife, Abigail Adams, During the Revolution."

ADAMS, Mrs. Florence Adelaide Powle, dramatic reader and teacher, born in Chelsea, .Mass., 15th October, 1863. Her maiden name was Fowle. Her father's family, originally from England, have been for many generations residents of the old Bay State. On her mother's side she is descended from the Earl of Seafield, who was her mother's great-grandfather, and from the Ogilvies, Grants, Gordons and Ichmartins of Scotland, tracing their ancestry back to 1300. She was graduated from the Chelsea public school and afterwards attended the girl's Latin school in Boston. She learned readily, making particularly

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rapid progress in the study of the languages, in which she was instructed by the divinity students During childhood she gave promise of great dra- who made their home with her family In 1772 matic power. This, combined with her pretty her father lost his property, and the diildren uere childish face and happy disposition, won her much forcec^ to provide for themselves "annah supported herself during the Revolutionary War Dy making lace and by teaching school. After the war f • . she opened a school to prepare young men for

college, in which she was very successful. Her principal work, a volume entitled "A View of Religious Opinions," appeared in 17S4. The labor necessary for so great a work resulted in a serious illness that threatened her with mental derange ment. That book passed through several editions in the United States and was republished in England. It is a work of great research and erudition. When the fourth edition was published, she changed the title to "A Dictionary of Religions." It was long a standard volume. Her second work, "A History of New England," appeared in 1799, andherthird, " Evidences of Christianity," in 1801. Her income from tliese successful works was meager, as she did not understand the art ot making money so well as she knew the art of making books. Her reputation e.xtended to Europe and won her many friends, among whom was Abbe Gregoire, who was then laboring to secure the emancipation of the Jews in Erance. With him she corresponded, and from him she received valuable aid in preparing her " History of the Jews," which appeared in 1S12. Her next book, "A Controversy with Dr. Morse," appeared in 1814, and her "Letters on the Gospels" in 1S26. All her books passed through many editions. Miss Adams was a uoman of great modesty and simplicity. Her life was very quiet; her only journey

attention, while it held out flattering prospects for the future. She was graduated from the Boston School of Oratory in 18S4, under the late Prof. Robert R. Raymond. In June, 1888, she was married to George Adams, a direct descendant of the statesmen and presidents. Her marriage has not interfered with her chosen line of work. Naturally of a sympathetic disposition, she has devoted much time and talent to charities. Having had from time to time many pupils to instruct, she felt the need of a text-book that should set forth the principles of the Delsarte system in a form easily grasped by the student. This led to the publication of her book "Gestures and Pantomimic Action" (Boston, iSgi). Mrs. Adams was her own model for the numerous illustrations used in tlie volume, and in this, as tliroughout the work, she had an invaluable critic in the person of her mother, who is also a graduate of the Boston School of Oratory. One distinguishing trait of Mrs. Adams' character is her great love for animals, not confined to a few pampered pets, but extended to the whole brute creation. Her personal appearance is pleasing. She is youthful looking and is fond of society in which she has ever been a general favorite.

ADAMS, Miss Hannah, the first woman in the United States t(^ make a profession of literature was born in Medfield, Mass., in 1755, and died in Brookline, Mass., 15th November, 1832. Her father was a well-to-do farmer of considerable education and culture. Hannah was a delicate child fond of reading and study. In childhood she memorized most of the poetical works of Milton, P(jpe. Thomson, Young and others. Her studies were varied, including Greek and Latin,