Women Philanthropists Born in the 1840's

Women Philanthropists Born in the 1840’s

Pauline Agassiz Shaw (1841-1917) was interested in educational experimentation.  Married to one of the richest Bostonians and widowed in 1908, she was able to finance the kindergartens set up by Elizabeth Peabody and others in the 1860s.  By 1883 she supported more than 31 kindergartens in greater Boston.  Seeing the need for child care for working mothers she set up day nurseries beginning in 1878.  Soon this concept expanded to include libraries, recreational facilities and evening classes in hygiene and sewing.

In 1881 she founded the North Bennet Street Industrial School to teach employment skills; this was later expanded to include liberal arts classes.  This vocational guidance movement rapidly spread and soon was sponsored by the education department of Harvard University.

Convinced of the need for woman suffrage, in 1901 she set up the Boston Equal Suffrage Association for Good Government.  She was president until 1917.   Maud Wood Park was executive secretary.

Phoebe Hearst (1842-1919) aided the Golden Gate Kindergarten Association of Sarah Cooper; she financed a building which housed 7 kindergartens.  She also supported libraries, museums and kindergartens in other areas – notably in Lead, South Dakota and Anaconda, Montana.  When George Hearst was appointed US Senator in 1886, Phoebe helped found the Columbian Kindergarten Association in 1893 and helped with building a training school for kindergarten teachers in 1897. She was a major contributor to the restoration of Mount Vernon and to the construction of the National Cathedral.   She founded the national Cathedral School for girls in 1900. 

Her contributions to the Berkeley campus of the University of California included creating an athletic and social center for women students about 1900.  In 1891 she had established several scholarships for women.  She supported other interests including archaeology, anthropology, architecture and music.

Fanny Garrison Villard (1844-1928) donated time, skill and money to many causes, beginning in 1878 with the Diet Kitchen Association’s distribution of milk and nutritional foods in New York slums.  She provided financial support to the New York Infirmary for Women and Children, the Woman’s Exchange and the Riverside Rest Association. 

She and some friends spearheaded the establishment of Barnard College (associated with Columbia University) and the Harvard Annex (later Radcliffe College.)  After 1900 she was a financial supporter of the Consumer’s League, the Working Woman’s Protective Association and also a Froebel kindergarten for black children.   She joined the suffrage movement in 1906 and served on the executive board of the New York State Woman Suffrage Association.  She debated the “antis,” testified at legislative hearings, and spoke at public gatherings.

Anna Russell Cole (1846-1926) donated $10,000 to Vanderbilt University in 1899 and in 1905 contributed $5000 to its library.  In 1926 she gave $10,000 to establish an office of dean of women.  She also aided worthy and needy students.  In 1912 she gave $7500 to the Southern Sociological Congress to study and improve social conditions which contributed to illiteracy, child labor and prostitution.  In 1916 she was a delegate to the International Peace Conference in Vienna, and after World War I she supported the League of Nations.

Olivia Stokes (1847-1927) and her sister Caroline (1854-1909) continued the philanthropic works of their parents by supporting many causes, including public baths and a lunch wagon in New York City to lessen the allure of the saloons.  They supported the zoo and several missionary causes.  Caroline's bequests in 1909 helped several black institutions and a chapel at Tuskegee.  The bulk of her estate was to be used to improve tenement housing and to educate Indians, "deserving” white students and black children in Africa and America.  Olivia continued her sister’s wishes.  Her own bequests included $100,000 to both Tuskegee and Hampton and a smaller amount to African schools.

Ellin Speyer (1849-1921) began her charitable activities in 1881 in New York by helping found the Hospital Saturday and Sunday Association and in 1886 helping establish the New York Skin and Cancer Hospital.  She was active in American Red Cross work in the Spanish-American War and World War I.  Her deep interest in working women led to founding a club for working girls.  She was president and treasurer from 1883 to 1913.  The club idea grew into a nationwide system of working girls’ societies.

Another abiding interest centered on animal welfare.  In 1910 she founded and was president of the New York Women’s League for Animals until her death.  Activities included parades and medals for the best-cared-for horses of police and other city workers. In her will she left $50,000 to her animal hospital, named after her death the Ellin Prince Speyer Free Hospital for Animals.