Page:Woman of the Century.djvu/700

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amendments submitted in Kansas in 1867, in Vermont in 1870, in Colorado in 1877, and in Nebraska in 1882. For the last twenty years she has been editor of the "Woman's Journal," published in Boston, and has all her life given her time, thought and means to the furtherance of the equal-rights movement.


STONE, Miss Martha Elvira, postmaster, born in North Oxford, Mass., 13th September, 1816. where she has always lived. She is the only daughter of the late Lieutenant Joseph Stone. Her early education was in the district school in her native village. MARTHA ELVIRA STONE. She was graduated from the Oxford Classical School. Later she took a course of study in the academy in Leicester, Mass. She was in August, 1835. bereft of her mother. To secure for herself an independence, she taught for several years near her home, in both public and private schools, until, on petitions of the citizens, she was appointed postmaster at North Oxford. The date of her commission was 27th April, 1857. under the administration of Hon. Horatio King, First Assistant Postmaster-General. That office she has held thirty-six years. During all that time the office has been kept in her sitting-room. In February, 1862, her father died. In October, 1864, her brother died, leaving a family of young children, the oldest of whom, Byron Stone, M. D., she educated. By vote of the town of Oxford she was elected a member of the examining school board in the spring of 1870, which office she held until 1873. Her time and talent outside of her public duties have been given to literary pursuits. She was for eight years a co-laborer with Senator George L. Davis, of North Andover, Mass., in his compilation of the "Davis Genealogy." She was at the same time associated with Supreme Court Judge William L. Learned, of Albany, N. Y., in his compilation of the "Learned Genealogy." The Learned and Davis families were intimately connected by frequent intermarriages. From the former Miss Stone traces her descent. She is the great-granddaughter of Colonel Ebenezer Learned, one of the first permanent settlers of Oxford, in 1713. During the Civil War she entered into it with zeal and personal aid to the extent of her ability, in all that contributed to the comfort and welfare of the soldiers. Her room was the depot for army and hospital supplies.


STOTT, Mrs. Mary Perry, business woman, born in Wooster. Wayne county, Ohio, 18th August, 1842, of English parentage. In 1852 her father with his family commenced the perilous trip across the plains for Oregon, then a land of vague and magnificent promise. After much privation and danger from hostile Indians and cholera, they arrived in Oregon City, then the largest settlement, afterward locating in Yam Hill county, where Mrs. Stott has since lived. Her life at that time was full of the privation and dangers incident to frontier existence everywhere. The schools were poor, but, with limited opportunities, she succeeded in educating herself for a teacher. She taught until she became the wife of F. D. Stott, in 1866. Since that time she has been an earnest and enthusiastic worker for female suffrage, higher education and kindred reforms. For the last twelve years she has been railroad station-agent in North Yam Hill, a position that affords her pleasant mental occupation, and for which she is especially fitted by reason of her business capacity. In addition to that charge, she oversees the working of her farm. She has been a widow for some years and has four living children. Her life is a busy and well-regulated one.


STOWE, Mrs. Emily Howard Jennings. physician, born in Norwich, Ontario, Canada, 1st May, 1831 She was educated in her native place, and Toronto, Ont., receiving a diploma of the grade A from the Toronto Normal School. She followed the profession of teacher prior and subsequent to her marriage. Her health becoming impaired, she determined that the infancy of her three children should not prevent the materialization of a long cherished desire to enter the field of medicine, at that time in Canada untrodden by women. That purpose received stimulus from the invalidism of her husband, whose feeble health demanded rest from business. She pursued her medical course in New York City, whither she was forced to go for the opportunity by that fear of intellectual competition with women which drives men to monopolize collegiate advantages. In 1866, obtaining the degree of Doctor of Medicine, she returned to Toronto to practice. A prevision of the difficulties which beset the path of a pioneer failed to daunt a courage born of the optimism of youth and a noble resolve for freedom in the choice of life's rights and duties. The notable incidents in her professional life are focused in the fact of successful achievements, which may be summed up as, first, in the secured professional standing of women physicians in Ontario, and second, in her individual financial success over the many economic difficulties which beset a woman who, without money, seeks to cast up for herself and others a new highway through society's brushwood of ignorance and prejudice, by creating a favorable public sentiment through her own isolated and laborious efforts. A just tribute is cheerfully accorded by her to the sustaining and helpful encouragement she has received from husband and children. Two of her children have entered the professional arena. The oldest, Dr. Augusta Stowe Gullen, was the first woman to obtain the medical degree from an Ontario university. She