fChild, Lydia Maria Francis1802╨1880author, editor and abolitionistBorn on February 11, 1802, in Medford, Massachusetts, into an abolitionist family, Lydia Francis spent one year in a seminary but was primarily influenced in her education by her brother, a Unitarian clergyman and later a professor at the Harvard Divinity School. Her first literary ventures, Hobomok, 1824, describing early Salem and Plymouth life, and The Rebels, 1825, describing pre-Revolutionary Boston, were received not for their artistic merit but for their interest as re-creations of real life. She also produced several practical volumes, including The Frugal Housewife, which went through 21 editions within a decade of its first appearance in 1829, and The Mother╒s Book, 1831. From 1825 to 1828 she conducted a private school in Watertown, Massachusetts. In 1826 she founded the nation╒s first monthly magazine for children, the Juvenile Miscellany. In October 1828 she married David L. Child, an editor, through whom she came under the influence of William Lloyd Garrison. In 1833 Child published An Appeal in Favor of That Class of Americans Called Africans, which was considered an outrageous abolitionist document because it contained a proposal to educate African-Americans. Child suffered social ostracism and had her membership in the Boston Athenaeum revoked. The Juvenile Miscellany died in 1834, and the popularity of her books fell off sharply, although her novel Philothea, 1836, enjoyed some success. The Appeal also won support. It converted some to abolitionism and brought about a new awareness of the issue among groups that previously had ignored it. In 1840 she became a member of the executive committee of the American Anti-Slavery Society. From 1841 to 1844 she and her husband edited the National Anti-Slavery Standard, a weekly newspaper published in New York City. In 1843╨1845 she published two very successful volumes of Letters from New York, originally columns contributed to the Boston Courier. In 1852 the Childs settled permanently on a farm in Wayland, Massachusetts. They continued to contribute liberally, from a small income, to the abolitionist movement. Among her later books were three volumes of Flowers for Children, 1844╨1847, Fact and Fiction, 1846, The Progress of Religious Ideas, through Successive Ages, 3 volumes, 1855, Autumnal Leaves, 1857, The Freedmen╒s Book, 1865, An Appeal for the Indians, 1868, and Aspirations of the World, 1878. Having persevered for many years in challenging her contemporaries with difficult questions on social injustice, she died in Wayland, Massachusetts, on October 20, 1880. ªstyl ` . ! ¬ 5¬ % 5¬ F !I l !I s !I ⌐ !I │ !I x !I î !I Γ !I ≤ !I ò !I ¿ !I ) 5¬ * !I B !I !I V !I i !I ╜ !I ╞ !I Θ !I ∩ !I !I / !I ¢ !I ░ !I ╪ !I µ !I Ω 5¬ δ !I └ !I ╘ !I ß !I ± !I ∙ !I 1 !I D !I S !I [ !I n !I v !I Å !I ¢ !I ┤ !I link `
