Woman of the Century/Mary Agnes Dalrymple Bishop

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.