Women of the Week

Abba Goold Woolson, an author from Windham, ME, and Julia McNair Wright, an author from Oswego, NY, had birthdays this week.  

• To learn about them by viewing their items, please click on their images.  

• To read their biographical sketches in A Woman of the Century, please click on the highlighted page number(s) to the left of their images.

Author Abba Louise Goold Woolson was born on her family compound in Windham, Maine, on April 30, 1838. She was the daughter of author and Maine historian William Goold. Her family had long-established roots in Maine and resided in Windham for several generations.

Abba received an education from the Portland public schools and attended the Girls' High School. She graduated from the Girls' High School as valedictorian in 1856. This year would prove to be exciting for Abba as it was also the year she married her high school principal, Professor Moses Woolson, and was first published in New York's Home Journal.

While living in Portland, Maine, Abba went on to start a successful and robust career as an author. She penned a series of popular poems for the Portland Transcript, a publication she contributed to for four years. Through the course of her writing career, she published dozens of essays, lectures, poems, and collections. In 1874, Abba edited and contributed to "Dress Reform," a series of lectures by women physicians of Boston on "Dress as It Effects the Health of Women." The lectures were originally delivered in the prior year as part of a dress-reform series sponsored by the New England Women’s Club. In this work, Abba amplified the voices of physicians speaking out against impractical dress.

Through her work as a teacher, she passed down her writing skills and wisdom. Abba was a teacher at the Mt. Auburn Girls' School and the Concord High School. Her talent as a poet led to several speaking engagements, including Portland's celebration of the Maine Centennial and the dedication of the Fowler Library in Concord, New Hampshire. Being one of New England's premier writers, it's no surprise that Abba served in many literary groups and societies. Her most notable commitments were serving as president of the Castilian Club and the Massachusetts Society for the University Education of Women.

Aside from her devotion to writing, teaching, and reform, Abba traveled extensively. Her travels included visiting the West Coast of the United States, Europe, and Morocco.

Abba passed away on February 6, 1921, at the age of 82.

Julia McNair Wright, an author, was born in Oswego, New York, on May 1, 1840.  Her A Woman of the Century profile notes: "She began her literary career at sixteen, by the publication of short stories" (804). Three years later, Julia contributed "The Life-Labor of Jean Garston" to the November 1859 edition of Ladies' Repository and also married Dr. William James Wright, a mathematician.

She wrote on topics that interested her, such as temperance and domestic life, and was extremely successful.  A Presbyterian, Julia penned several Anti-Catholic works, such as Secrets of the convent and confessional: an exhibition of the influence and workings of papacy upon society and republican institutions.  She also wrote nature books for children.  In 1895, Julia became the editor for the home department of The St. Louis Presbyterian.

Julia passed away in Fulton, Missouri, on September 2, 1903.  Her obituary in The Indianapolis Journal highlighted that Julia's "'Nature Readers' have been translated into several foreign languages and are in preparation as a textbook for the blind."