Mine eyes have seen the glory: A biography of Julia Ward Howe

Literature & Fiction

Clifford, Deborah Pickman

United States

Little,Brown

The Passion of Abby Hemenway: Memory, Spirit, and the Making of History

Abby Maria Hemenway's life and work offer a unique portrait of a 19th-century literary woman. Hemenway is chiefly remembered as the editor of the Vermont Historical Gazetteer, a five-volume compendium of the state's local history published between 1860 and 1892, a monumental work that is still in constant use today by historians and genealogists. Hemenway never married, and at the age of 36 she formally converted and entered the Catholic Church, which anchored her life for the bulk of her professional career.For 30 years, Hemenway managed her own publishing empire, engaging hundreds of people to write for her and countless others to help in various ways. No one else in the US attempted to do what Hemenway did: to collect and publish single-handedly the history of every town in her state. And she accomplished this feat in spite of obstacles posed by her status as a single woman, and a devout Catholic, not simply in post-Civil War New England, but also in a field of endeavor overwhelmingly dominated by elite Protestant men. Frequently told that "history is not suitable work for a woman," she persevered and eventually triumphed, though not without considerable adversity.Hemenway's life is a wonderful and gripping story of survival and accomplishment, struggle and betrayal, driven by her passion for storytelling, oral history, spiritual experience, and the sacredness of everyday life. Hers is an epic life principally because she viewed her work of preserving Vermont's history as a holy cause, worth fighting for at all costs. She endured floods and conflagrations, chronic indebtedness and lawsuits, yet she never let any of these difficulties hinder her work. To this day, our knowledge of Vermont history, and the light it sheds on community life in the early republic, owes a great debt to Hemenway and her Gazetteer.Deborah P. Clifford, author of two previously published biographies, is herself a gifted storyteller. She skillfully narrates Hemenway's life story with verve and insight.

Biographies & Memoirs

Community & Culture

Vermont Historical Society

Abby Maria Hemenway's life and work offer a unique portrait of a 19th-century literary woman. Hemenway is chiefly remembered as the editor of the Vermont Historical Gazetteer, a five-volume compendium of the state's local history published between 1860 and 1892, a monumental work that is still in constant use today by historians and genealogists. Hemenway never married, and at the age of 36 she formally converted and entered the Catholic Church, which anchored her life for the bulk of her professional career. For 30 years, Hemenway managed her own publishing empire, engaging hundreds of people to write for her and countless others to help in various ways. No one else in the US attempted to do what Hemenway did: to collect and publish single-handedly the history of every town in her state. And she accomplished this feat in spite of obstacles posed by her status as a single woman, and a devout Catholic, not simply in post-Civil War New England, but also in a field of endeavor overwhelmingly dominated by elite Protestant men. Frequently told that "history is not suitable work for a woman," she persevered and eventually triumphed, though not without considerable adversity. Hemenway's life is a wonderful and gripping story of survival and accomplishment, struggle and betrayal, driven by her passion for storytelling, oral history, spiritual experience, and the sacredness of everyday life. Hers is an epic life principally because she viewed her work of preserving Vermont's history as a holy cause, worth fighting for at all costs. She endured floods and conflagrations, chronic indebtedness and lawsuits, yet she never let any of these difficulties hinder her work. To this day, our knowledge of Vermont history, and the light it sheds on community life in the early republic, owes a great debt to Hemenway and her Gazetteer. Deborah P. Clifford, author of two previously published biographies, is herself a gifted storyteller. She skillfully narrates Hemenway's life story with verve and insight.

In their new book, Deborah Pickman Clifford and Nicholas R. Clifford revisit the devastating flood that wreaked unprecedented destruction on New England in November 1927. Vermont sustained the greatest damage by far, with eighty-four deaths (or three-quarters of the total casualties) and property losses totaling thirty to forty million in 1927 dollars (more than eighty-six dollars for every man, woman, and child then in the state). These losses were proportionally far higher than the corresponding ones suffered in the regions ravaged by the huge Mississippi floods earlier that year. In these pre-FEMA years and in true Green Mountain State style, Vermonters by and large had to confront the emergency on their own, and this at a time when the boom of the mid and late 1920s had largely bypassed Vermont, a rural state with little industry and a stagnant population. Contrary to popular belief, however,Vermont did accept federal, Red Cross, and other outside assistance. "The Troubled Roar of the Waters" is the story of the flood, the formation and work of emergency relief committees, the efforts to rebuild in a harsh climate, and the ways in which the disaster fundamentally affected the state's political and social development. Though the 1920s traditionally have been represented primarily as a prelude to the Depression and the New Deal, new scholarship sees the nation entering a period of rapid and unnerving change in these years. Cities and suburbs mushroomed, the automobile revolutionized society, new and larger forms of business and industry flourished, and tensions mounted between new immigrants and the "old stock." The Cliffords build on this, using public and private archival collections to inform their riveting story, fleshing out the historical record and adding key perspectives to this broader emerging debate over how the decade is viewed. For specialists and general readers alike, the authors place the story of the 1927 flood within the larger context of early twentieth-century American history, establishing the event and its aftermath as emblematic of the age."

"the Troubled Roar of the Waters": Vermont in Flood and Recovery, 1927-1931 (Revisiting New England: The New Regionalism)

History

Clifford, Nicholas R.

Americas

University Press of New England

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Books by Clifford, Deborah Pickman