Woman of the Century/Jane Elizabeth D. Conklin

CONKLIN. Mrs. Jane Elizabeth Dexter, born in Utica, N. Y., 7th July, 1831. Her great-grandfather, George Grant, of Abemethy, Scotland, came to America in 1774. He joined the Continental Army and served during the Revolutionary War Her mother was the daughter of William W. Williams, an architect of Albany, N. Y. An uncle of Mrs. Conklin, Asahel Dexter, was a captain in the War of 1812. Mrs. Conklin's father was born in Paris, N. Y., his parents having removed to that place from Mansfield, Conn., in the latter part of the last century. He was a cousin of John G. Saxe, the poet Miss Dexter received her education in the Utica Female Academy and in Mrs. Brinkerhoff’s school for young ladies, Albany, N. Y. Her first composition was written in verse. When she was fourteen years old, her poems were first published, and since that time she has been almost continuously writing. While none of her poems are strictly hymns, many of them are sung in religious meetings. She was, for many years, a contributor to the Utica "Gospel Messenger. " She also wrote for a New York weekly, and for several local papers, prose articles as well as poetry. In December, 1865, she became the wife of Cramer H. Conklin, a veteran of the Civil War, and since that time she has lived in Binghamton, N. Y. Mrs. Conklin always took great interest in the War of the Rebellion and in the defenders of the Republic. When the Grand Army of the Republic post, to which her husband belongs, formed a Relief Corps of the wives and daughters of the numbers, her name was one of the first signed to a call for a charter. Shortly after the corps was JANE ELIZABETH DEXTER CONKLIN. organized, she was elected its president, and for three years held that office. In 1884 she published a book of poems, which was favorably received. She has in preparation a second volume of poems.