Page:Woman of the Century.djvu/331

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326
GOODWIN.
GORDON.

In King's Chapel, cemetery. Boston, is the grave of an ancestor marked by a stone from a foreign quarry, dating back to the Colonial period and bearing the coat-of-arms of the English Tyler family From childhood she was an earnest reader and an ambitious student, yet no less a lover of nature and replete with physical activity. While very young her habit of whispering "made-up" stories to herself on her nightly pillow furnished amusement to older listeners. From sensitiveness on the point, her earliest writings were either destroyed or sedulously concealed, until finally some pieces of verse that accidentally fell under a friendly eye were forwarded to a city newspaper and published without her knowledge. When between fourteen and fifteen years old she taught a district school, and for a few years until her marriage was alternately teacher and pupil. Circumstances have developed Mrs. Goodwin's literary talent in the direction of versatility rather than specialty. After having conducted departments for women and children, and become favorably known as a writer of stories, at the beginning of 1869 she was made associate editor of the " Watchman," in especial charge of its family page, and the connection exists still, after an interval of service on the "Journal of Education." A season in California and Mexico tested her ability as a correspondent, and she was employed in that capacity in the Philadelphia Centennial and in the Paris Exposition of 1878, her published letters winning general admiration. She has produced a number of serials, one for a leading London journal. Two juvenile volumes from her pen have appeared, "Little Folks' Own" and "The Little Helper." The former, a collection of stories and verses, had a large sale. Besides contributing much to various popular publications for young people, she has gained recognition in art and general literature As a writer of poetry she is represented in many anthologies.


ANNA A. CORDON. GORDON, Miss Anna A., author and temperance worker, born in Boston, Mass., 21st July, 1853. Miss Gordon studied for years in the Newton high school and in Mount Holyoke Seminary. She went to Europe in 1875 and spent a year with her sister, Mrs. Alice Gordon Guhck, the founder of the College for Girls in San Sebastian, Spain. Miss Anna has fine musical talents. She was studying the organ in Boston, in 1877, when she was introduced to Miss Will. ml, who was holding meetings, on D. L. Moody's invitation, in connection with his Boston tabernacle. Miss Gordon was a member of the Congregational Church, and she became organist in Miss Willard's daily gospel meeting. Miss Willard promptly recognized her abilities, and for years these two zealous women have worked in the same field. Miss Gordon has served as Miss Willard's private secretary, as superintendent of juvenile work for the World's Woman's Christian Temperance Union, and as associate national superintendent of the same department. As a speaker to children she excels, having a winsome presence, graceful bearing, great earnestness, sincere consecration and something to say. She has put her methods to the proof by conducting juvenile organizations for years in Evanston, Ill., where she lives with Miss Willard and her mother in their " Rest Cottage " home. Miss Gordon is an excellent writer and has a charming gift of verse-writing, both humorous and pathetic. She also composes music that is in large request among white-ribboners. She has furnished to the children her "Marching Songs." of which 300,000 copies have been sold, and a second series, with the same title, reached an edition of 50.000 in a few months. She has prepared the "Songs of the Young Women's Christian Temperance Union" for the "Y's," and on invitation of the National Woman's Christian Temperance Union now has in hand a hymnal for that great society. Her book of " (Questions Answered" is a complete manual of juvenile temperance work, and her "Prohibition Programme " is a delightful evening entertainment, by means of which the Band of Hope "puts money in its purse," while her droll "collection speech," in rhyme, has been used a thousand times. All of these have been given to the Women's Temperance Publishing House, Chicago. She has published a "White Ribbon Birth-day Book." Miss Gordon has traveled with Miss Willard an average of 10,000 miles a year, and in 1883 went with her to every State and Territory, making a trip of about 30,000 miles and assisting in twenty State and Territorial conventions. Public-schools. Sunday-schools, summer Chautauquas, conventions, all have heard her plans and pleas for the temperance cause. Miss Gordon is a notable housekeeper, after the choicest New England pattern ; a famous financier, so that her chief never carries a purse or looks after a bill: and as a mere item in her daily duties she turns off an amount of correspondence that would be occupation enough for the average private secretary.


GORDON, Miss Elizabeth P., temperance advocate, was born in Boston. Mass., and is the third daughter of James M. Gordon, who was for eleven years treasurer of the American Board of Foreign Missions, for twenty years cashier of the Columbia National Bank and one of the most typical and beloved honorary members of the white- ribboned army. Three of his daughters are prominent in the councils of that society. Miss Bessie was for seven years corresponding secretary of the Woman's Christian Temperance Union of Massachusetts, and is now one of its speakers and organizers. Reared in the most conservative manner in