Woman of the Century/Hannah J. Bailey

BAILEY, Mrs. Hannah J., philanthropist and reformer, born in Cornwall-on-the-Hudson, N.Y., 5th July, 1839. Her maiden name was Hannah Clark Johnston, and she was the oldest of a family of eleven children. Her parents were David and Letitia Johnston. Mr. Johnston was by occupation a tanner, but in 1853 he became a farmer, locating in Plattekill, Ulster county, N. Y. He was a minister in the Society of Friends, and on Sundays the family worshiped in the quiet little church near their home. Hannah passed! her busy and studious girlhood on the homestead, and in 1858 she began to teach school. She continued to teach successfully until 1867. In that year she accompanied a woman preacher on a mission to the churches and institutions for criminals and for charity, within the limits of the New England Yearly Meeting of Friends. While on that mission, she met Moses Bailey, a noble and active Christian, to whom she was married in October, 1868. A peaceful, useful train of years followed until his death, in 1882, and she was left with one son, Moses Melvin Bailey, then twelve wars of age. At the time of her husband's death Mrs. Bailey was very ill, but afterwards rallied to gather up the threads of his life-work and her own, and since then she has carried them steadily forward. Her husband's oil-cloth manufactury. and also a retail carpet store in Portland, Maine, was carried on under her management until, in 1889, she sold the manufacturing establishment, and in 1891 her son assumed the care and possession of the business in HANNAH J. BAILEY. Portland. For thirty years she has been a Sabbath-school teacher, and she continually adds new branches to her church work, holding positions on the Providence and Oak Grove Boarding School committees, and on other important committees of the church and other philanthropic organizations. She is treasurer of the Woman's Foreign Missionary Society of the New England Yearly Meeting of Friends and is always active in its interests. In 1883 Mrs. Bailey joined the Woman's Christian Temperance Union and entered heartily into its work of reform. She was always a strong advocate of peace principles, and in 1887, when the department of peace and arbitration was created, she was appointed superintendent of it. In 1888 she was made the superintendent of that department for the World's Woman's Christian Temperance Union. With active brain, willing heart and generous hand, she prosecutes this work, employing a private secretary, editing and publishing two monthly papers, "The Pacific Banner" and "The Acorn," besides millions of pages of literature. She is State superintendent of the Sabbath observance department of the Maine Woman's Christian Temperance Union, and is also working itly in the interests of securing a reformatory prison for women in her State. She is the author of "Reminiscences of a Christian Life" (1884). In every branch of philanthropic work she is found to be interested. For the church, for the school, for the young man or woman who is striving for an education, her heart and purse are always open. Her home is in Winthrop Center, Maine.