Page:Woman of the Century.djvu/91

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BISHOP.
BISHOP.

principal of the union school in Silver Creek, N. Y. She afterwards gave several years to the study of Delsarte work in various cities. In 1884 she became the wife of Coleman E. Bishop, editor of the "Judge," New York. They soon went to Black Hills, Dak., to live. Mrs. Bishop was elected superintendent of public schools in Rapid City, S. Dak., being the nrst woman thus honored in the Territory. In the following year she was invited to establish a Delsarte department in the Chautauqua School of Physical Education, in the Chautauqua Assembly, New York. She has had charge of that department for four seasons, and it has steadily grown in popularity. In 1891 it was the largest single department in the Assembly. From the Chautauqua work has grown a large public work in lecturing and teaching. She has written a number of articles for various magazines and has published one book, "Americanized Delsarte Culture." At present Mrs. Bishop's home is in Washington, D. C.


BISHOP, Mrs. Mary Agnes Dalrymple, journalist, born in Springfield, Mass., 12th August, MARY AGNES DALRYMPLE BISHOP. 1857. She is the only child of John Dalrymple and his wife. Prances Ann Hewitt. She has always been proud of her old Scotch ancestry and her ability to trace the family back from Scotland to France, where, early in the twelfth century, William de Darumpill obtained a papal dispensation to marry his kinswoman, Agnes Kennedy. It is scarcely a century since her grandfather came to this country. On her maternal side she traces her ancestry to the Mayflower, which brought over her several-times-removed grandmother May. In local papers her childhood poems were printed readily, but the reading of Horace Greeley's "Recollections of a Busy Life," in which he has some good advice for youthful writers, caused her to determine not to be tempted to allow her doggerel to be published, and for years she adhered to her determination. When she was less than two years old, her parents removed with her to Grafton. Worcester county, Mass., and at the age of sixteen years she became the local editor of the Grafton "Herald." Beginning the week following her graduation, she taught in the public schools of Grafton and Sutton for many years. During that time she gave lectures quite frequently in the vicinity and often appeared in the home drama, making her greatest success as "Lady Macbeth." Miss Dalrymple was a frequent contributor to the ' Youth's Companion " and other publications, never adopting a pen-name and rarely using her own name or initials. In 1887 she accepted an editorial position on the "Massachusetts Ploughman." The position offered her had never been taken by a woman, and, indeed, the work that she did was never attempted previously, for she had the charge of almost the entire journal from the first. A few months after she accepted the position, the proprietor died, and the entire paper was in her hands for six months. In the autumn the paper was purchased by its present owner, but the chief editorial work remained in her hands. The paper was enlarged from four to eight pages in the meantime and, as Defore, was published each week. In the autumn of 1889 she became the wife of Frederick Herbert Bishop, a Boston business man. Together they engage in literary pursuits and the work and pleasure of life along its varied lines. Their home is located on Wollaston Heights. Mrs. Bishop does not content herself with editorial work, but is interested in literature in general. She is one of the few newspaper women who is a practical reportorial stenographer. She is a member of the executive committee of the New England Woman's Press Association, of which she was one of the first members.


BISLAND, Miss Elizabeth, journalist, born in Camp Bisland. Fairfax plantation, Teche county, La., in 1863. Her family, one of the oldest in the South, lost its entire property while she was a child and Miss Bisland became impressed, at an early age, with the necessity of doing something toward the support of herself and relatives. Having shown a talent for writing, this, naturally, was the line Of work along which she began her career. Her first sketches, published at the age of fifteen, were written under the pen-name B. L. R. Dane, and were favorably received by the New Orleans newspapers to which they were sent. Miss Bisland did considerable work for the New Orleans "Times-Democrat" and, later, became literary editor of that paper. After a few years' work in New Orleans she decided to enter the literary field in New York and for a time did miscellaneous work for newspapers and periodicals in that city. In a short time she was offered the position of literary editor of the "Cosmopolitan Magazine " which she accepted. It was while engaged upon that magazine that Miss Bisland undertook her noted journey around the earth in the attempt to make better time than that of Nellie Bly, who was engaged to perform the same journey in the interest Of the New York "World"; Miss lily going east while Miss Bisland took the western direction. Although she did not succeed in defeating her rival. Miss Bisland made such time as to command the admiration of the civilized world. In May, 1890, she went to London. Eng., in the interest of the "Cosmopolitan," and her letters to that magazine, from London and Paris, have been widely read and appreciated. In addition to her journalistic work, she has also written, in Collaboration with Miss Rhoda Broughton, a one-volume novel; also a romance and play in Conjunction with the same author. She became the wife of Charles W. Wetmore of New York, 6th October, 1891, and they reside in that city.