Born in Medford, Massachusetts, Lydia Maria Child first came to live in Wayland  in 1853 to care for her ailing father on Old Sudbury Road. It would be her home for the rest of her life. Both she and her husband, David, are buried in Wayland’s North Cemetery.

Mrs. Child, or Maria as she chose to be called, has been honored by her election to the National Women’s Hall of Fame in Seneca Falls, New York, and the National Abolition Hall of Fame in Peterboro, New York. She was one of the few Caucasians, and only woman, whose photograph is featured at the Smithsonian Museum of African History and Culture in Washington, DC along with her contributions to the abolitionist movement.

She was an abolitionist who willingly forfeited her promising writing career which was almost unheard of for any gender in early 19th century America, when she published one of the first books, Appeal in Favor of that Class of Americans Called Africans, advocating for the immediate emancipation of slaves and an end to discrimination against African Americans.

While still in her twenties, Maria was a best-selling author of both novels and of advice books for the “middling class”– women who could not afford servants.  Her American Frugal Housewife was in its twelfth edition only three years after its release in 1829.

She was a pioneer of children’s literature with her publication of Juvenile Miscellany in 1826. An exhibit at the Boston Public Library several years ago, sponsored by Boston College, credited her with the first writing for children that did not specifically advocate and inculcate a specific religion.

Yet she willingly gave up her budding career to dedicate her life to reforms and, most particularly, the abolition of slavery. She was the first woman to edit a newspaper dedicated to public policy- the National Anti-Slavery Standard.

She was a tireless advocate for all human rights with a personal stake in women’s rights. She supported a woman’s right to vote although she would not live to have that right. “For forty years, I have keenly felt the cramping effects of my limitations as a woman, and I have submitted to them under a perpetual and indignant protest. It is too late for the subject to be of much interest to me personally. I have walked in fetters thus far, and my pilgrimage is drawing to a close. But I see so clearly that domestic life and public life would both be greatly ennobled by the perfect equality and companionship of men and women, in every department of life, that I long to have it an accomplished fact, for the order and well-being of the world.”

She was the family bread-winner in a man’s world.

She promoted religious tolerance.

She was a loving friend and neighbor. The Wayland Museum and Historical Society contains many items that belonged to her, donated by the local families who had received them as gifts.

She was the author of one of the most enduring poems ever written which starts out as “over the river and through the wood,” and celebrates Thanksgiving Day-a holiday that represents togetherness rather than gifts.

Maria never compromised her fundamental moral principles. Her famous “Letters from New York” published during her two years at the Standard, attacked a wide range of social problems: urban poverty, an unjust prison system, capital punishment, the oppression of women, prostitution, alcoholism, and prejudice against Jews, Catholics, Irish and Indians. She never saw her belief in abolition as anything more than the most pressing injustice in her overall need to secure fundamental human rights for all people and enable this country to fulfill its destiny.

In the years leading up to the Civil War, Maria became a fierce champion of all those who dedicated themselves to the cause of abolition, and employed her pen to lament every measure by the federal government to make war inevitable. She supported the radical abolitionist John Brown and even offered to care for him after his raid on Harpers Ferry, Virginia. During the Civil War and afterwards, she devoted herself to aiding emancipated slaves in their quest for education and equal rights.

Unfortunately, Maria is a victim of her own desire to champion her causes and not to glorify herself. A pioneer in the literary world, made even more impressive by the fact that she was a woman, she deserves more recognition. Waylanders should be proud to share our community with such a person.

Submitted by Jane Sciacca