visitors who had come to see her baby sister. She thought that she ought
to feel sorry for the baby, too. When she was a little older, Elizabeth
Cady realized what a pity it was that girls and women could not have the
same privileges and advantages as had boys and men.
Elizabeth Cady was born at Johnstown, New York, November 12, 1815. When
this little girl grew up, she called the first Woman’s Rights Convention
and worked all her life to gain more privileges for women. As a child
she felt the disadvantages of being a girl in the early days of the
1800’s.
When her only brother, a fine promising college graduate, died,
eleven-year-old Elizabeth realized that her father loved his son far
more than all of his five daughters. Longing to comfort him Elizabeth
climbed on his knee.
“Oh, my daughter, would that you were a boy!” was all that he could say.
From that moment Elizabeth resolved to equal boys. To be learned and
courageous she decided was the way to accomplish her purpose. Before
breakfast the next morning she went to her dear friend and pastor and
asked him to teach her Greek. She insisted on beginning that very
minute. To prove herself courageous she learned to drive a horse, and to
leap a fence and ditch on horseback.
Within a short time she began to study Greek, Latin, and mathematics
with a class of boys at the village academy. She did so well that she
won the second prize, a Greek testament. Joyfully Elizabeth rushed home
expecting to hear her father say, “Now, you are equal to a boy.”
However, his kisses and praise failed to take away the sting of his
remark, “Ah, you should have been a boy!” Elizabeth’s father was a
distinguished lawyer and judge. His office adjoined the house, and there
his little daughter spent much of her time talking with his students and
listening to his clients.
Often his clients were widows who wept and complained that the property
which they had brought into the family had been willed to their sons.
Elizabeth could not understand why her father, who was wise and kind,
could not help these poor women. Then Judge Cady would take down from
the shelves a big volume and show her the law.
The students, seeing how interested she was in the laws about women,
amused themselves by reading to her the most unfair laws that they could
find. They often teased her, too, in order to hear her bright remarks.
Little Elizabeth was so distressed by the unfairness of the law in
regard to women that she made up her mind to cut them all out of her
father’s law books. She refrained from doing this upon learning that it
would not help the situation.
Much to her disgust Elizabeth Cady could not go to college, as did her
boy classmates, for at that time girls were not admitted. However, she
entered the Willard Seminary for girls in Troy, New York, where she
studied for some time. Later she went on with her studies at home, never
losing her interest in laws for women.
In her twenty-fifth year Elizabeth Cady married Henry B. Stanton, a
lecturer on antislavery, who later became a lawyer. After several happy
years in Johnstown and Boston, the young couple settled in Seneca Falls,
New York. By this time the champion of woman’s rights began to know by
experience something of a woman’s home problems. She had a big house to
manage with very little help, and her lively girls and boys needed
constant care.
In her round of everyday duties, however, Mrs. Stanton did not forget
the wrongs to women. She, together with Lucretia Mott and some others,
called a big meeting, the first Woman’s Rights Convention, at Seneca
Falls in 1848, to talk over this question.
At this meeting Mrs. Stanton and her coworkers presented a Declaration
of Sentiments based upon the Declaration of Independence. They also
presented eleven resolutions, one of which demanded the vote for women.
Mrs. Stanton was entirely responsible for this resolution and placed
great emphasis upon it. She believed that through the ballot for women
all other rights for women could be secured.
The newspapers made a great deal of fun of all the reforms discussed at
the convention, particularly the proposal that women should vote. In
those days most people were quite ready to admit that a woman could
manage her home capably and be bright and entertaining in company.
However, they thought it very unwomanly that she should dream of helping
to make laws to secure better schools or cleaner streets.
Mrs. Stanton was surprised and distressed to have her very serious
purpose treated so lightly, but ridicule did not prevent her from
upholding woman’s rights whenever she had an opportunity.
Three years after this she met Susan B. Anthony, the woman who was to be
her lifelong friend and fellow-worker. Except for their lectures in the
cause of temperance and antislavery, Mrs. Stanton and Miss Anthony gave
their whole lives to gaining more freedom for their fellow-women.
The two friends were very different in characteristics, but they were of
one mind on the question of woman’s rights. Miss Anthony had not at
first thought it necessary for women to have the vote, but she was soon
won over to her friend’s opinion. Year after year these two earnest
workers endeavored to arouse the country to do something for women.
Never a jealous thought as to which one should have the glory for
anything accomplished marred this fifty years of friendship.
Mrs. Stanton and Miss Anthony lectured in big cities and all sorts of
little out-of-the way places. Together with their friend Mrs. Gage, they
wrote a very complete history of what had been done to gain the vote for
women.
Of Mrs. Stanton’s children, a daughter, Mrs. Harriot Stanton Blatch, has
followed directly in her mother’s footsteps as a public speaker for the
cause of women. She has also written several books about woman’s place
in the work of the world. Theodore Stanton, one of the sons, also writes
in behalf of women.
Throughout a long lifetime Elizabeth Cady Stanton courageously and
steadfastly pleaded the cause of women. She lived to see them enjoying
better property rights and educational privileges, and in four states
helping to make the laws. Eighteen years after her death the Nineteenth
Amendment gave the vote to women throughout the United States.
[Illustration]
Harriet Beecher Stowe—
The Girl Whose Story of Slavery Aroused the Whole World
It was the night of the annual exhibition of the Litchfield Academy.
Twelve-year-old Harriet Beecher waited eagerly for a certain part of the
program. Presently she heard read before all the learned people
assembled the familiar words of her own composition, one of the three
chosen for this great occasion.
As Harriet listened to the sentences that she had composed with so much
care, she watched the face of her father who sat on the platform. It
brightened. She knew that he was interested.
At the close of the entertainment she heard him ask, “Who wrote that
composition?”
Her teacher replied, “Your daughter, sir.”
It was the proudest moment of Harriet’s life. When this little academy
student became a woman she wrote a book which set the whole world to
thinking of the evil of slavery. It was _Uncle Tom’s Cabin_.
Harriet Beecher was born at Litchfield, Connecticut, June 14, 1811. Her
father had only a country parson’s meagre salary to provide for the
wants of eleven children. What a father he was—grave and serious enough
in the pulpit, but full of fun and enthusiasm at home. It was mere play
for Harriet and the boys to pile wood, when their father superintended.
Harriet was very rich in sisters and brothers. She loved them all
dearly, especially the merry, energetic big sister, Catherine, and the
chubby little boy two years younger than she, Henry Ward Beecher, who
grew up to be a famous minister.
Little Harriet had only a sweet memory of her mother who had died when
she was a small child. Wherever she went, she was told of her mother’s
beautiful life. It made her very happy to know that she had a mother
whom everyone loved.
There were no expensive toys in the Beecher family, but Harriet was well
content without them. She played with her glass-eyed wooden doll and a
set of cups and saucers made by her own hands out of codfish bones. In
the woodpile she found treasures in the moss and lichens on the logs.
From them she fashioned little pictures using the moss for green fields,
sprigs of spruce for the trees, and bits of glass for lakes and rivers.
Some of Harriet’s happiest hours were spent curled up in a corner of her
father’s study, surrounded by her favorite books. It was a peaceful,
restful place, she thought. She liked to glance up at her dear father as
he was writing or thinking over his sermons. She enjoyed looking at the
friendly faces of the books on the shelves. Very few of them, however,
were books that she could understand.
One day while rummaging in a barrel of old sermons in the attic, Harriet
came upon a copy of the _Arabian Nights_. How she and her brothers pored
over its pages! Another precious treasure discovered in a barrel was
Shakespeare’s play, _The Tempest_.
Harriet’s delight in stories was satisfied in another way. Every fall it
was the custom to make enough apple sauce to last for the winter. It
took a whole barrelful for the big Beecher family. All the little
fingers were pressed into service to peel or quarter apples. Mr. Beecher
would then ask who could tell the best story. As the apples bubbled and
hissed in the big brass kettle, story after story went around. Mr.
Beecher, himself, recited scenes from Sir Walter Scott’s novels, which
were then new.
In the unheated, barnlike meetinghouse where Mr. Beecher preached,
Harriet also spent many happy hours, although she was cold and cramped
from sitting through the long sermons. Usually she did not understand
her father’s big words, but one day he spoke so earnestly and simply
about God’s love that Harriet never forgot it.
When Harriet grew up, she married Calvin Ellis Stowe. He was a professor
in the Lane Theological Seminary, in Cincinnati, Ohio, of which her
father had become the president.
In Ohio, adjacent to the slave state of Kentucky, everybody was thinking
and talking about slavery. The Fugitive Slave Law, whereby runaway
slaves must be returned to their masters, was causing heated
discussions. Mrs. Stowe and her husband believed this to be a very
unjust law and they helped a colored girl, the “Eliza” of _Uncle Tom’s
Cabin_, to escape from her pursuers. Mrs. Stowe opened a school for
colored children in her house, and raised money to buy the freedom of a
slave boy.
Ever since the days of her school compositions Mrs. Stowe had enjoyed
writing, and some of her stories had found their way into the papers.
When Professor Stowe went to Bowdoin College, in Brunswick, Maine, to
teach, his wife tried to do a little writing to add to his small salary.
However, the work of looking after a large house and her family of small
children left her little time for writing stories. Sometimes with her
paper on the corner of the kitchen table and her ink on the teakettle,
she managed to write a story, superintend the making of pastry, and
watch the baby at the same time.
One day Mrs. Stowe received a letter from a relative urging her to write
something that would stir the country against the evil of slavery. She
earnestly declared that she would.
Soon thereafter the plot for her story, _Uncle Tom’s Cabin_, flashed
across her mind. She wrote a chapter as quickly as possible and sent it
to the _National Era_, an antislavery paper. Chapter after chapter
followed, written rapidly as the scenes of the story presented
themselves to her. When it was completed it was published as a book. In
a few days ten thousand copies were sold; in a year, three hundred
thousand copies.
Mrs. Stowe wrote many other books, though none of them attained the
prominence of _Uncle Tom’s Cabin_. This book is considered to have been
one of the most influential and widely read novels in literature.
From distinguished people all over the world came letters of
congratulation to Mrs. Stowe. What she had written just because she felt
that she must, with no thought of money or fame, brought her both.
Harriet Beecher Stowe was further honored by being elected to the Hall
of Fame in 1910.
Harriet Beecher Stowe’s gift of expression, which she had been
cultivating for many years under all sorts of difficulties, made it
possible for her to draw a picture of slavery that aroused the whole
world.
[Illustration]
Kate Douglas Wiggin—
Who Put the Joy of Living Into Her Books
Although Katie Smith loved all the books on the black walnut
bookshelves, the ones that she took down most often were some fat
volumes by Charles Dickens. So much did she enjoy these stories that she
named her yellow dog “Pip” after a character in one of them; and across
her sled in big scarlet letters were painted the words “The Artful
Dodger.”
One day Katie’s mother read in the paper that Mr. Charles Dickens had
come to America. When Katie heard that he was going to give a reading
from his books in Portland, Maine, only sixteen miles away, she was very
much excited. How she longed to see and hear the wonderful man who had
created so many delightful characters!
Katie and her mother had planned to go to Charlestown, Massachusetts,
for a visit, stopping overnight in Portland. Now Katie’s mother decided
that they would leave home so as to be in Portland on the night of the
reading. But alas! a grown-up cousin, instead of little Katie, was taken
to hear Mr. Dickens.
Katie bore her disappointment as best she could, and the next day after
the reading she received her reward. Who should be riding on the very
same train with Katie and her mother, but the great Charles Dickens
himself! While Katie’s mother was talking with an acquaintance, the
little girl slipped into the empty seat beside her favorite author.
“Where did you come from?” inquired Mr. Dickens in a surprised tone of
voice.
“I came from Hollis, Maine,” stammered Katie Smith.
Presently the little girl and the famous author were chatting away like
old friends. Mr. Dickens chuckled when he heard about the naming of
Katie’s dog and her sled, and his eyes grew moist when she spoke of the
characters that made her cry.
This nine-year-old admirer of Dickens had not the slightest idea that
one day she would be an author herself. Years later, however, when she
was known as Kate Douglas Wiggin, she wrote a delightful story about
another little State-of-Maine girl, entitled _Rebecca of Sunnybrook
Farm_. She also wrote many other enjoyable books.
Kate Douglas Smith was not a State-of-Maine girl by birth. She was born
in Philadelphia, September 28, 1859. When she was six years old her
family moved to the village of Hollis, Maine.
Little Katie Smith loved the world in which she lived and especially her
own little corner of it on the banks of the Saco River. What fun she had
with her little sister Nora and her playmate Annie. Nora is better known
to us as Nora Archibald Smith, the author of many charming stories for
children. These little girls gathered velvety pussy willows, hunted for
arbutus in the early spring, and picked wild strawberries and
raspberries in the summer.
How amusing Katie found the froggery, a nice quiet pool where lived her
favorite frogs! She knew them all by name and twice a week she arranged
them very gently in a row on a strip of board for a singing lesson. In
the winter she enjoyed coasting and snowballing. She also liked to be in
the house where she could play with her orphanage of paper dolls and
read her beloved books.
To little Katie Smith, work was almost as amusing as play. It was fun,
she thought, to cut up rhubarb for sauce, to make milk toast for supper,
to water the plants, to iron the handkerchiefs, and to go for the milk.
Just to be alive, to run along the river bank, to help about the house,
was enough for this joyous child. No dreams of authorship had come to
her, though she was filling her mind with the pictures which she was
later to give to the world in her books.
Katie Smith was taught at home and also attended a district school.
Later she went to a boarding school in Maine, after which she attended
Abbot Academy in Andover, Massachusetts, from which she was graduated.
When Kate Smith was seventeen years old she followed her family to Santa
Barbara, California, where they had gone several years before. As there
was very little money in the family treasury, the elder daughter of the
house felt that she must begin to help at once. A girl’s story which she
had written merely to amuse herself she decided to send to a magazine
editor. What was Kate’s delight to receive in payment for the story a
check for one hundred and fifty dollars, which came just in time to pay
some taxes!
The proud young author, however, did not think of writing for a living.
She decided that she did not yet know enough to write. She realized that
she must live a little longer and learn more. In the meantime she
decided to find some useful work to do. Years later, after she had
become a successful author, she said that this decision was the most
sensible act of her life.
Kate Smith soon found the work that she sought. Kindergartens were still
very new in America. Miss Smith studied the system and organized a free
kindergarten in San Francisco, the first one to be established west of
the Rockies. This young woman was very successful in bringing happiness
into the lives of the little children who flocked to her kindergarten.
It was for the purpose of raising money for kindergartens that the young
teacher wrote two stories, _The Story of Patsy_, and _The Birds’
Christmas Carol_. She had them printed and sold at twenty-five cents a
copy. Miss Smith thought that the only reason they sold well was because
so many friends were anxious to help the good cause of free
kindergartens. Little did she realize that these books would later bring
her fame.
In 1880 Kate Douglas Smith married Samuel Bradley Wiggin, who was a
California lawyer. It was not until several years later that Mrs. Wiggin
thought of sending a paper-covered copy of _The Birds’ Christmas Carol_
to a publisher. This charming story of the Ruggles family was accepted
at once and more stories requested. From that time on Mrs. Wiggin
devoted herself to writing.
Girls and boys of to-day all over the world love her Rebecca, Carol,
Patsy, and Timothy just as the little girl of Hollis, Maine, loved the
children in Dickens’ stories. Kate Douglas Wiggin wrote often for
children because she loved them and never forgot what it is like to be a
child. She has also written many very entertaining books for older
people.
“Rebecca” is not, as some people have thought, small Katie Smith
herself. However, the district school where Rebecca wrote her famous
composition was the one that the author attended.
In Kate Douglas Wiggin’s books are many pictures of the life that she
lived as a child. She put herself into her books, but not as a
character. In her stories you will find something of her own quick wit,
her cheerfulness, her satisfaction in doing and helping, and her joy of
living.
[Illustration]
Frances E. Willard—
The Girl Who Fought The Dragon, Drink
Frances called her brother Oliver’s attention to the new law that she
had written the previous night for “Fort City.” It read: “We will have
no saloons or billiard halls, and then we will not need any jails.”
This little girl’s favorite game was to plan a play city, a place where
everyone could live happily. She took a special delight in making laws
for the health and pleasure of the citizens of her city.
Planning the city was only play, but in this game as well as in all
others Frances Willard showed her remarkable ability as an organizer.
Little did she realize that years later this ability would make her a
valuable leader of the Temperance Cause.
Frances Elizabeth Willard was born at Churchville, New York, September
28, 1839. When she was but a tiny child, her parents moved to Oberlin,
Ohio, in order that they might study at the university. After a few
years of happy student life, Mr. Willard was obliged to give up his
books and his dream of becoming a minister for a life outdoors in the
West.
What an adventure the journey was for the three little Willards! There
were no fine Pullman trains in which they could travel, for there were
no railroads in that section of the country in those days. Three clumsy
prairie schooners carried them to their new home. Frances and her little
sister Mary rode in the third, perched comfortably enough among the
cushions on the top of their father’s old-fashioned desk. For three
weeks they traveled over the prairies, stopping only to cook their
meals, gypsy-fashion, and to rest on Sundays.
“Forest Home” was the name given to the pretty rustic cottage that Mr.
Willard built among the oaks and hickory groves, by the banks of the
Rock River, near Janesville, Wisconsin. It was a delightful place in
which to spend a happy childhood. To be sure, the Willards’ only callers
at first were the chipmunks and birds, but there were no dull days.
Every minute was filled. Frances did her share of the household tasks
and far more than her share in planning the family games.
Although the lively Frances was the leader in all the fun, there was one
sport in which she was not allowed to join. This was horseback riding.
Confiding to her brother that she _must_ ride something, she tried the
cow. Her father laughed when he saw her on her clumsy steed, and allowed
her to have a horse after that. This simple way of disposing of
difficulties served her well all her life.
Active and full of fun as Frances Willard was, she liked to be quiet and
thoughtful too. A black oak in the garden bore the sign:
The Eagle’s Nest—Beware!
High up in the leafy branches Frances would sit for hours, making up
bits of verse or editing the “Fort City” newspaper.
On Sunday afternoons the children would wander with their mother in the
orchard while she talked to them about the beauty that God had created.
They realized that God was very near.
Frances was quite young when she first heard from her parents of the
unhappiness that drink brings. With the other children she signed a
pledge written in the big family Bible, and ending:
“So here we pledge perpetual hate
To all that can intoxicate.”
For some years Mrs. Willard took charge of the children’s lessons, but
later a young woman from the East came to teach them and some of their
little neighbors. No child was ever more hungry for knowledge than
little Frances Willard. She often declared that she wanted to learn
everything.
There came a day when Frances was very happy and excited. A little
schoolhouse had been built in the woods about a mile away. It was so
small and brown and plain that she called it “a sort of big ground-nut,”
but it was a real schoolhouse, with a Yale graduate for a teacher.
Later on Frances and Mary went away to college. They attended Milwaukee
Female College, and then Northwestern Female College at Evanston,
Illinois, from which they were graduated. At these two schools
energetic, high-spirited Frances was a leader, both in and out of the
classroom.
Frances Willard was the same earnest, hungry-minded, determined girl
when she became a teacher that she had been as a student. She began to
teach in her own “brown-nut” schoolhouse during her first college
vacation. After her graduation from college she spent a number of years
in the teaching profession. During this time she was at the head of
several important schools. She concluded her teaching career as Dean of
the Woman’s College in Northwestern University.
About this time many people were becoming alarmed at the amount of
drunkenness throughout the United States. They were distressed by the
misery caused by drink. In the small towns in the Middle West, women
often marched through the streets singing, praying, and begging saloon
keepers to give up their business.
In Chicago a band of women, marching to the City Council to ask to have
the Sunday closing law enforced, were rudely treated by the mob. Frances
Willard had never forgotten the pledge that she had signed in the family
Bible. The insults to these women aroused her fighting spirit. She felt
that she must help.