100-461: Frances Eliza Hodgson Burnett (24 November 1849 – 29 October 1924) was a British-American novelist and playwright. She is best known for the three children's novels Little Lord Fauntleroy (1886), A Little Princess (1905), and The Secret Garden (1911). Frances Eliza Hodgson was born in Cheetham , Manchester , England. After her father died in 1853, when Frances was 4 years old,
200-415: A brother were married. Although she remained friends with Swan, neither was in a hurry to be married. With the income from her writing, she returned to England for an extended visit in 1872, and then went to Paris where, having agreed to marry Swan, she ordered an haute couture wedding dress to be made and shipped to Tennessee. Shortly afterward, she returned home and attempted to postpone the wedding until
300-569: A childhood injury that left him lame and unable to participate in physical activities. Not long after they met, Swan left for college in Ohio. Frances turned to writing to earn money. Her first story was published in Godey's Lady's Book in 1868. Soon after, she was being published regularly in Godey's Lady's Book , Scribner's Monthly , Peterson's Magazine and Harper's Bazaar . Keen to escape from
400-538: A dramatic interpretation of That Lass o' Lowrie's in response to a pirated stage version presented in London. After a visit to Boston in 1879, where she met Louisa May Alcott , and Mary Mapes Dodge , editor of children's magazine St. Nicholas , Burnett began to write children's fiction. For the next five years, she had published several short works in St. Nicholas . Burnett continued to write adult fiction as well: Louisiana
500-559: A fad for formal dress for American middle-class children: What the Earl saw was a graceful, childish figure in a black velvet suit, with a lace collar, and with lovelocks waving about the handsome, manly little face, whose eyes met his with a look of innocent good-fellowship. The Fauntleroy suit appeared in Europe as well but nowhere was it as popular as in America. The classic Fauntleroy suit
600-475: A few weeks and published to good reviews. In the spring of 1901, when she returned to the country, Townsend tried to replace her long-time publisher Scribner's with a publishing house offering a larger advance. In the autumn of 1902, after a summer of socializing and filling Maytham with house-guests, she suffered a physical collapse. She returned to America, and in the winter of 1902 entered a sanatorium . There she told Townsend she would no longer live with him, and
700-466: A few years, Burnett became well known in Washington society and hosted a literary salon on Tuesday evenings, often attended by politicians, as well as local literati . Swan's practice grew and had a good reputation, but his income lagged behind hers, so she believed she had to continue writing. Unfortunately she was often ill and suffered from the heat of D.C., which she escaped whenever possible. In
800-619: A fifth time, Hodgson died suddenly of a stroke , leaving the family without an income. Frances was cared for by her grandmother while her mother took over running the family business. From her grandmother, who bought her books, Frances learned to love reading, in particular her first book, The Flower Book , which had colored illustrations and poems. Because of their reduced income, Eliza had to give up their family home and moved with her children to live with relatives in Seedley Grove , Tanners Lane , Pendleton , Salford , where they lived in
900-491: A gentle, pleading expression, resembling that of the late little Lord Fauntleroy who must, by the way, be quite old now, and an awful prig. The first stage adaptation of Hodgson's novel, titled simply Little Lord Fauntleroy , opened at the Prince of Wales' Theatre in London on 23 Feb 1888. Written by E.V. Seebohm, the piece in three acts was "suggested by Mrs F. H, Burnett's story", starred Annie Hughes as Cedric and played only
1000-587: A good audience, although her brothers tended to tease her about her stories. Manchester was almost entirely dependent on a cotton economy that was ruined by the Lancashire cotton famine brought about by the American Civil War . In 1863, Eliza Hodgson was forced to sell their business and move the family once again to an even smaller home; at that time, Frances' limited education came to an end. Eliza's brother (Frances's uncle), William Boond, asked
1100-449: A homeless bootblack named Dick Tipton tells Cedric's old friend Mr. Hobbs, a New York City grocer, that a few years prior, after the death of his parents, Dick's older brother Benjamin married an awful woman who got rid of their only child together after he was born and then left. Benjamin moved to California to open a cattle ranch while Dick ended up in the streets. At the same time, a neglected pretender to Cedric's inheritance appears in
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#17327905320511200-560: A house with a large enclosed garden in which Frances enjoyed playing. For a year Frances went to a small dame school run by two women, where she first saw a book about fairies. When her mother moved the family to Islington Square, Salford, Frances mourned the lack of flowers and gardens. Their new home was located in a gated square of faded gentility adjacent to an area with severe overcrowding and poverty that "defied description", according to Friedrich Engels , who lived in Manchester at
1300-466: A large home off Cromwell Road, had it decorated, and then turned it over to cousins to run as a boarding house, after which she moved to London, where she again took rooms, enjoyed the London season, and prepared Phyllis for production, a stage adaptation of The Fortunes of Philippa Fairfax . When the play ran she was disappointed by the bad reviews and turned to socialize. During this period she began to see more of Stephen Townsend, whom she had met during
1400-602: A lecture tour of Britain and, to make up the royalties that she could not receive there, the Glasgow New Association for the Abolition of Slavery set up Uncle Tom's Offering. According to Daniel R. Vollaro, the goal of the book was to educate Northerners on the realistic horrors of the things that were happening in the South. The other purpose was to try to make people in the South feel more empathetic towards
1500-485: A minority of boys wore ringlet curls with these suits, but the photographic record confirms that many boys did. It was most popular for boys about 3–8 years of age, but some older boys wore them as well. It has been speculated that the popularity of the style encouraged many mothers to breech their boys earlier than before, and it was a factor in the decline of the fashion for dressing small boys in dresses and other skirted garments. Clothing that Burnett popularised
1600-509: A newer attached building, and was able to raise the substantial funds necessary to restore the house. It is now open to the public. The Harriet Beecher Stowe House in Hartford , Connecticut , is the house where Stowe lived for the last 23 years of her life. It was next door to the house of fellow author Mark Twain . In this 5,000 sq ft (460 m ) cottage-style house, there are many of Beecher Stowe's original items and items from
1700-640: A novel and play, and became influential in the United States and in Great Britain , energizing anti-slavery forces in the American North , while provoking widespread anger in the South . Stowe wrote 30 books, including novels, three travel memoirs, and collections of articles and letters. She was influential both for her writings as well as for her public stances and debates on social issues of
1800-493: A period of two years she could plead desertion as a reason for the divorce. The press was critical, calling her a New Woman , with The Washington Post writing that the divorce resulted from Burnett's "advanced ideas regarding the duties of a wife and the rights of women". From the mid-1890s, she lived in England at Great Maytham Hall —which had a large garden where she indulged her love for flowers—where she made her home for
1900-437: A period when sentimental fiction was the norm, and in the United States the "rags to riches" story popular, Little Lord Fauntleroy was a hit. Edith Nesbit included in her own children's book The Enchanted Castle (1907) a rather unflattering reference: Gerald could always make himself look interesting at a moment's notice (...) by opening his grey eyes rather wide, allowing the corners of his mouth to droop, and assuming
2000-469: A play with a starring role for Stephen Townsend in an attempt to establish his acting career. After a two-year absence from her Washington, D.C. home, her husband, and her younger son, Burnett returned there in March 1892, where she continued charity work and began writing again. In 1893, Burnett published an autobiography, devoted to her elder son, titled The One I Knew Best of All . Also in that year, she had
2100-483: A set of her books displayed at the Chicago World Fair . Burnett returned to London in 1894; there she heard the news that her younger son Vivian was ill, so she quickly went back to the United States. Vivian recovered from his illness, but missed his first term at Harvard University . Burnett stayed with him until he was well, then returned to London. At this time, she began to worry about her finances: she
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#17327905320512200-505: A short season of matinees. After discovering her novel had been plagiarized for the stage, Burnett successfully sued and then wrote her own theatrical adaptation titled The Real Little Lord Fauntleroy . Opening on 14 May, at Terry's Theatre in London it played for 57 matinees and was subsequently presented in the English provinces, France, Boston and New York City. The Broadway production of Burnett's play opened on 10 December 1888, at
2300-480: A sister, Catharine Beecher , who became an educator and author, as well as brothers who became ministers, including Henry Ward Beecher , who became a famous preacher and abolitionist, Charles Beecher , and Edward Beecher . Harriet enrolled in the Hartford Female Seminary run by her older sister Catharine, where she received a traditional academic education – rather uncommon for women at
2400-487: A title-page designed by Hammatt Billings . In less than a year, the book sold an unprecedented 300,000 copies. By December, as sales began to wane, Jewett issued an inexpensive edition at 37 + 1 ⁄ 2 cents each to stimulate sales. Sales abroad, as in Britain where the book was a great success, earned Stowe nothing as there was no international copyright agreement in place during that era. In 1853, Stowe undertook
2500-504: A vision of a dying slave during a communion service at Brunswick's First Parish Church, which inspired her to write his story. What also likely allowed her to empathize with slaves was the loss of her eighteen-month-old son, Samuel Charles Stowe. She noted, "Having experienced losing someone so close to me, I can sympathize with all the poor, powerless slaves at the unjust auctions. You will always be in my heart Samuel Charles Stowe." On March 9, 1850, Stowe wrote to Gamaliel Bailey , editor of
2600-498: A well-to-do Manchester family. Her father owned a business in Deansgate , selling ironmongery and brass goods. The family lived comfortably, employing a maid and a nurse-maid. Frances had two older brothers and two younger sisters. In 1852, the family moved about a mile away to a newly built terrace, opposite St Luke's Church, with greater access to outdoor space. Barely a year later, on 1 September 1853 and with his wife pregnant for
2700-599: A year, 300 babies in Boston alone were named Eva (one of the book's characters) , and a play based on the book opened in New York in November. Southerners quickly responded with numerous works of what are now called anti-Tom novels , seeking to portray Southern society and slavery in more positive terms. Many of these were bestsellers, although none matched the popularity of Stowe's work, which set publishing records. After
2800-483: Is attested as a real surname since the 13th century. In a shabby New York City side street in the mid-1880s, young Cedric Errol lives with his mother (known to him as "Dearest") in genteel poverty after the death of his father, Captain Cedric Errol. One day, they are visited by a British lawyer named Liam with a message from young Cedric's paternal grandfather, the Earl of Dorincourt, a millionaire who despises
2900-702: Is buried in Roslyn Cemetery. In 1936, a memorial sculpture by Bessie Potter Vonnoh was erected in her honor in Central Park 's Conservatory Garden. The statue depicts her two famous Secret Garden characters, Mary and Dickon. Frances Eliza Hodgson was born at 141 York Street in Cheetham , Manchester on 24 November 1849. She was the third of five children of Edwin Hodgson, an ironmonger from Doncaster in Yorkshire , and his wife Eliza Boond, from
3000-688: Is reconciled to his American daughter-in-law, realizing that she is far superior to the impostor. The Earl had planned to teach his grandson how to be an aristocrat. Instead, Cedric teaches his grandfather that an aristocrat should practice compassion towards those dependent on him . The Earl becomes the man Cedric always innocently believed him to be. Cedric is happily reunited with his mother and with Mr. Hobbs, who decides to stay to help look after Cedric. The Fauntleroy suit (see also Buster Brown suit ), so well described by Burnett and realised in Reginald Birch's detailed pen-and-ink drawings, created
3100-586: Is the former home of her father Lyman Beecher on the former campus of the Lane Seminary. Her father was a preacher who was greatly affected by the pro-slavery Cincinnati Riots of 1836 . Harriet Beecher Stowe lived here until her marriage. It is open to the public and operated as a historical and cultural site, focusing on Harriet Beecher Stowe, the Lane Seminary and the Underground Railroad. The site also presents African-American history. In
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3200-428: Is the sole master of it, and she cannot draw a penny ... [I]n the English common law a married woman is nothing at all. She passes out of legal existence. In the 1870s, Stowe's brother Henry Ward Beecher was accused of adultery, and became the subject of a national scandal. Unable to bear the public attacks on her brother, Stowe again fled to Florida but asked family members to send her newspaper reports. Through
3300-469: The Broadway Theatre , New York City. The original cast follows: Touring versions of the play were common in the late 19th and early 20th century. A 1906 version cast 11-year-old Buster Keaton in the role of Lord Fauntleroy. In 1994, an Australian open-air/site specific theatre production of Little Lord Fauntleroy , adapted by Julia Britton and directed by Robert Chuter, was presented in
3400-629: The United States and was very disappointed when his youngest son married an American woman. With the deaths of his father's elder brothers, Cedric has now inherited the title Lord Fauntleroy and is the heir to the earldom and a vast estate. Cedric's grandfather wants him to live in the United Kingdom and be educated as a British aristocrat . He offers his son's widow a house and guaranteed income, but refuses to have anything else to do with her, even after she declines his money. However,
3500-542: The 1870s and 1880s, Stowe and her family wintered in Mandarin , Florida, now a neighborhood of modern consolidated Jacksonville , on the St. Johns River . Stowe wrote Palmetto Leaves while living in Mandarin, arguably an eloquent piece of promotional literature directed at Florida's potential Northern investors at the time. The book was published in 1873 and describes Northeast Florida and its residents. In 1874, Stowe
3600-518: The 1880s, Burnett began to travel to England frequently and in the 1890s bought a home there, where she wrote The Secret Garden . Her elder son, Lionel, died of tuberculosis in 1890, which caused a relapse of the depression she had struggled with for much of her life. She divorced Swan Burnett in 1898, married Stephen Townsend in 1900, and divorced him in 1902. A few years later she settled in Nassau County , New York, where she died in 1924 and
3700-405: The 77-year-old Stowe started writing Uncle Tom's Cabin over again. She imagined that she was engaged in the original composition, and for several hours every day she industriously used pen and paper, inscribing passages of the book almost exactly word for word. This was done unconsciously from memory, the author imagining that she composed the matter as she went along. To her diseased mind the story
3800-602: The Beecher sisters, Caroline Lee Hentz , Salmon P. Chase (future governor of Ohio and United States Secretary of the Treasury under President Abraham Lincoln ), Emily Blackwell , and others. Cincinnati's trade and shipping business on the Ohio River was booming, drawing numerous migrants from different parts of the country, including many escaped slaves , bounty hunters seeking them, and Irish immigrants who worked on
3900-512: The De Willoughby Claim ; and in 1901 she had published The Making of a Marchioness and The Methods of Lady Walderhurst. In 1898, when Vivian graduated from Harvard, she divorced Swan Burnett. Officially, the cause for the divorce was given to be desertion, but in reality, Burnett and Swan had orchestrated the dissolution of their marriage some years earlier. Swan took his own apartment and ceased to live with Burnett so that after
4000-423: The Earl is impressed by the appearance and intelligence of his American grandson and is charmed by his innocent nature. Cedric believes his grandfather to be an honorable man and benefactor, and the Earl cannot disappoint him. The Earl therefore becomes a benefactor to his tenants, to their delight, though he takes care to let them know that their benefactor is the child, Lord Fauntleroy. Meanwhile, back in New York,
4100-512: The Jubilee year. In December 1890, Burnett's elder son Lionel died from consumption in Paris, which greatly affected her life and her writing. Burnett had sought a cure for her son from physicians, also taking him to Germany to visit spas . Following his death, before she sank into a deep depression, she wrote in a letter to a friend that her writing was insignificant in comparison to having been
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4200-606: The Marshall Key family, one of whose daughters was a student at Lane Seminary. It is recorded that Mr. Key took her to see a slave auction, as they were frequently held in Maysville. Scholars believe she was strongly moved by the experience. The Marshall Key home still stands in Washington. Key was a prominent Kentuckian; his visitors also included Henry Clay and Daniel Webster . The Uncle Tom's Cabin Historic Site
4300-624: The United Kingdom, the pretender's mother claiming that he is the offspring of the Earl's eldest son, Bevis. The claim is investigated by Dick and Benjamin, who come to the United Kingdom and recognize the woman as Benjamin's former wife. She flees, and the Tipton brothers and the pretender, Benjamin's son, do not see her again. Afterward, Benjamin goes back to his cattle ranch in California where he happily raises his son by himself. The Earl
4400-480: The United States to England. Accompanied by her sons, she visited tourist attractions such as Madame Tussaud's Wax Museum in London. In her rented rooms, she continued the Tuesday evening salon and soon attracted visitors, meeting Stephen Townsend for the first time. Despite her busy schedule, she felt ill from the heat and the crowds of tourists, spending protracted periods in bed. With her sons, she moved on to spend
4500-517: The United States. She had wanted her second child to be a girl, and having chosen the name Vivien, changed to the masculine spelling for her new son. The family continued to rely on her writing income, and to economize she made clothing for her boys, often including many frills. Later, Burnett continued to make clothing, designing velvet suits with lace collars for her boys and frilly dresses for herself. She allowed her sons' hair to grow long, which she then shaped into long curls. After two years in Paris,
4600-466: The United States; in time, however, Little Lord Fauntleroy lost the popularity that The Secret Garden has retained. Several of Burnett's novels for adults were also very popular in their day, according to the Publishers Weekly list of bestselling novels in the United States. A Lady of Quality was second in 1896 , The Shuttle was fourth in 1907 and fifth in 1908 , T. Tembarom
4700-589: The affair, she remained loyal to her brother and believed he was innocent. After her return to Connecticut, Mrs. Stowe was among the founders of the Hartford Art School, which later became part of the University of Hartford . Following the death of her husband, Calvin Stowe, in 1886, Harriet started rapidly to decline in health. By 1888, The Washington Post reported that as a result of dementia
4800-812: The area, Frances's uncle lost much of his business and was unable to provide for the newly arrived family. The family went to live in a log cabin during their first winter in New Market , outside Knoxville. They later moved to a home in Knoxville that Frances called "Noah's Ark, Mt. Ararat ", a name inspired by the house's location atop an isolated hill. Living across from them was the Burnett family, and Frances became friendly with Swan Burnett, introducing him to books by authors such as Charles Dickens , Sir Walter Scott and William Makepeace Thackeray that she had read in England. She may have befriended him because of
4900-660: The campus is now protected as a National Historic Landmark. The Stowes were ardent critics of slavery and supported the Underground Railroad , temporarily housing several fugitive slaves in their home. One fugitive from slavery, John Andrew Jackson , wrote of hiding with Stowe in her house in Brunswick as he fled to Canada in his narrative titled The Experience of a Slave in South Carolina (London: Passmore & Albaster, 1862). Stowe claimed to have had
5000-406: The couple went to Pegli for their honeymoon, where they endured two weeks of steady rain. Burnett's biographer Gretchen Gerzina writes of the marriage, "it was the biggest mistake of her life". The press stressed the age difference—Townsend was ten years younger than she—and she referred to him as her secretary. Biographer Ann Thwaite doubts Townsend loved Burnett, claiming that 50-year-old Burnett
5100-537: The day. Harriet Elisabeth Beecher was born in Litchfield, Connecticut , on June 14, 1811. She was the sixth of 11 children born to outspoken Calvinist preacher Lyman Beecher . Her mother was his first wife, Roxana (Foote), a deeply religious woman who died when Stowe was only five years old. Roxana's maternal grandfather was General Andrew Ward of the Revolutionary War . Harriet's siblings included
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#17327905320515200-895: The dress arrived, but Swan insisted they marry as soon as possible, and they were married in September 1873. Writing about the dress disappointment to a Manchester friend, she said of her new husband: "Men are so shallow ... he does not know the vital importance of the difference between white satin and tulle , and cream-colored brocade ". Within the year, she gave birth to her first child, Lionel, in September 1874. Also during that year, she began work on her first full-length novel, That Lass o' Lowrie's , set in Lancashire. The couple wanted to leave Knoxville, and her writing income allowed them to travel to Paris, where Swan continued his medical training as an eye and ear specialist. The birth of their second son, Vivian, forced them to return to
5300-540: The early 1880s she became interested in Christian Science as well as Spiritualism and Theosophy . These beliefs would affect her later life as well as being incorporated into her later fiction. She was a devoted mother and took great joy in her two sons. She doted on their appearance, continuing the practice of curling their long hair each day, which became the inspiration for Little Lord Fauntleroy . In 1884, she began work on Little Lord Fauntleroy , with
5400-800: The end of her life she was suffering from Alzheimer's disease . Harriet Beecher Stowe died on July 1, 1896, in Hartford, Connecticut , 17 days after her 85th birthday. She is buried in the historic cemetery at Phillips Academy in Andover, Massachusetts , along with her husband and their son Henry Ellis. Multiple landmarks are dedicated to the memory of Harriet Beecher Stowe, and are located in several states including Ohio, Florida, Maine and Connecticut. The locations of these landmarks represent various periods of her life such as her father's house where she grew up and where she wrote her most famous work. The Harriet Beecher Stowe House in Cincinnati, Ohio ,
5500-411: The expansion of married women's rights, arguing in 1869 that: [T]he position of a married woman ... is, in many respects, precisely similar to that of the negro slave. She can make no contract and hold no property; whatever she inherits or earns becomes at that moment the property of her husband ... Though he acquired a fortune through her, or though she earned a fortune through her talents, he
5600-529: The family fell on straitened circumstances and in 1865 emigrated to the United States, settling in New Market, Tennessee . Frances began her writing career there at age 19 to help earn money for the family, publishing stories in magazines. In 1870, her mother died. In Knoxville, Tennessee , in 1873 she married Swan Burnett, who became a medical doctor. Their first son Lionel was born a year later. The Burnetts lived for two years in Paris , where their second son Vivian
5700-526: The family intended to move to Washington, D.C., where Swan, now qualified as a doctor, wanted to start his medical practice. However, as they were in debt, Frances was forced to live with Swan's parents in New Market while he established himself in D.C. Early in 1877, she was offered a contract to have That Lass o' Lowrie's published, which was doing well in its serialization, and at that point, she made her husband her business manager. That Lass o' Lowrie's
5800-525: The family to join him in Knoxville, Tennessee , where he now had a thriving dry goods store. Within the year, Eliza decided to accept his offer and move the family from Manchester. She sold their possessions and told Frances to burn her early writings in the fire. In 1865, the family emigrated to the United States and settled near Knoxville. After the end of the Civil War and the trade it had brought to
5900-497: The family's poverty, she tended to overwork herself, later writing that she had been "a pen driving machine" during the early years of her career. For five years, she wrote constantly, often not worrying about the quality of her work. Once her first story was published, before she was 18, she spent the rest of her life as a working writer. By 1869, she had earned enough to move the family into a better home in Knoxville. Her mother died in 1870, and within two years, two of her sisters and
6000-549: The historical gardens of the National Trust of Australia (Victoria) property Rippon Lea. Harriet Beecher Stowe Harriet Elisabeth Beecher Stowe ( / s t oʊ / ; June 14, 1811 – July 1, 1896) was an American author and abolitionist . She came from the religious Beecher family and wrote the popular novel Uncle Tom's Cabin (1852), which depicts the harsh conditions experienced by enslaved African Americans . The book reached an audience of millions as
6100-457: The little woman who wrote the book that started this great war", but this story has been found to be apocryphal. Her own accounts are vague, including the letter reporting the meeting to her husband: "I had a real funny interview with the President." Stowe purchased property near Jacksonville, Florida . In response to a newspaper article in 1873, she wrote, "I came to Florida the year after
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#17327905320516200-647: The marriage ended. She returned to Maytham two years later in June 1904. Maytham Hall had a series of walled gardens and in the rose garden she wrote several books; it was there she had the idea for The Secret Garden , mainly written at the manor house in Buile Hill Park while visiting Manchester. In 1905 A Little Princess was published, after she had reworked the play into a novel. Once again Burnett turned to writing to increase her income. She lived an extravagant lifestyle, spending money on expensive clothing. It
6300-417: The marriage, and he just wanted her money and to be in control of her as a husband. Unable to bear the thought of continuing to live with Townsend at Maytham, Burnett rented a house in London for the winter of 1900–1901. There she socialized with friends and wrote. She worked on two books simultaneously: The Shuttle , a longer and more complicated book; and The Making of a Marchioness , which she wrote in
6400-608: The mother of two boys, one of whom died. At this time she turned away from her traditional faith in the Church of England and embraced a mix of Spiritualism, New Thought, Christian Science, and others without actually joining any particular church. She returned to London, where she sought the distraction of charity work and formed the Drury Lane Boys' Club, hosting an opening in February 1892. Also during this period, she wrote
6500-549: The national movement toward integration by more than a half century. The marker commemorating the Stowe family is located across the street from the former site of their cottage. It is on the property of the Community Club, at the site of a church where Stowe's husband once served as a minister. The Church of our Saviour is an Episcopal Church founded in 1880 by a group of people who had gathered for Bible readings with Professor Calvin E. Stowe and his famous wife. The house
6600-484: The next decade, although she continued annual transatlantic trips to the United States. Maytham Hall resembled a feudal manor house which enchanted Burnett. She socialized in the local villages and enjoyed the country life. She filled the house with guests and had Stephen Townsend move in with her, which the local vicar considered a scandal. In February 1900 she married Townsend. The marriage took place in Genoa , Italy, and
6700-707: The next several years she had published in Children's Magazine several shorter works. In 1911 she had The Secret Garden published. In her later years she maintained the summer home on Long Island, and a winter home in Bermuda . The Lost Prince was published in 1915, and The Head of the House of Coombe and its sequel, Robin, were published in 1922. Burnett lived for the last 17 years of her life in Plandome Manor, where she died on 29 October 1924, aged 74. She
6800-434: The novel set a precedent in copyright law when Burnett won a lawsuit in 1888 against E. V. Seebohm over the rights to theatrical adaptations of the work. The title surname Fauntleroy is an Anglo-French term ultimately derived from Le enfant le roy ("child of the king"), evoking the image of being pampered and spoiled. More proximally, it is from a Middle English variant faunt from enfaunt , meaning child or infant. It
6900-452: The people they were forcing into slavery. The book's emotional portrayal of the effects of slavery on individuals captured the nation's attention. Stowe showed that slavery touched all of society, beyond the people directly involved as masters, traders and slaves. Her novel added to the debate about abolition and slavery, and aroused opposition in the South. In the South, Stowe was depicted as out of touch, arrogant, and guilty of slander. Within
7000-405: The serialization beginning in 1885 in St. Nicholas , and the publication in book form in 1886. Little Lord Fauntleroy received good reviews, became a bestseller in the United States and England, was translated into 12 languages and secured Burnett's reputation as a writer. The story features a boy who dresses in elaborate velvet suits and wears his long hair in curls. The central character, Cedric,
7100-587: The start of the Civil War , Stowe traveled to the capital, Washington, D.C., where she met President Abraham Lincoln on November 25, 1862. Stowe's daughter, Hattie, reported, "It was a very droll time that we had at the White house I assure you ... I will only say now that it was all very funny – and we were ready to explode with laughter all the while." What Lincoln said is a minor mystery. Her son later reported that Lincoln greeted her by saying, "so you are
7200-404: The state's canals and railroads. In 1829, the ethnic Irish attacked blacks , wrecking areas of the city, trying to push out these competitors for jobs. Beecher met a number of African Americans who had suffered in those attacks, and their experience contributed to her later writing about slavery. Riots took place again in 1836 and 1841 , driven also by native-born anti-abolitionists. Harriet
7300-447: The time period. In the research library, which is open to the public, there are numerous letters and documents from the Beecher family. The house is open to the public and offers house tours on the hour. In 1833, during Stowe's time in Cincinnati , the city was afflicted with a serious cholera epidemic. To avoid illness, Stowe made a visit to Washington, Kentucky , a major community of the era just south of Maysville . She stayed with
7400-489: The time – with a focus in the classics , languages, and mathematics. Among her classmates was Sarah P. Willis, who later wrote under the pseudonym Fanny Fern . In 1832, at the age of 21, Harriet Beecher moved to Cincinnati, Ohio , to join her father, who had become the president of Lane Theological Seminary . There, she also joined the Semi-Colon Club , a literary salon and social club whose members included
7500-517: The time. Frances had a fertile imagination, writing stories of her own creation in old notebooks. One of her favorite books was Harriet Beecher Stowe 's novel Uncle Tom's Cabin , and she spent many hours acting out scenes from the story. Frances and her siblings were sent to be educated at The Select Seminary for Young Ladies and Gentlemen, where she was described as "precocious" and "romantic". She had an active social life and enjoyed telling stories to her friends and cousins; in her mother, she found
7600-593: The topic. The result was a mass exodus of the Lane students , together with a supportive trustee and a professor, who moved as a group to the new Oberlin Collegiate Institute after its trustees agreed, by a close and acrimonious vote, to accept students regardless of "race", and to allow discussions of any topic. It was in the literary club at Lane that she met Rev. Calvin Ellis Stowe , a widower who
7700-647: The war and held property in Duval County ever since. In all this time I have not received even an incivility from any native Floridian." Stowe is controversial for her support of Elizabeth Campbell, Duchess of Argyll , whose grandfather had been a primary enforcer of the Highland Clearances , the transformation of the remote Highlands of Scotland from a militia-based society to an agricultural one that supported far fewer people. The newly homeless moved to Canada, where very bitter accounts appeared. It
7800-400: The weekly anti-slavery journal The National Era , that she planned to write a story about the problem of slavery: "I feel now that the time is come when even a woman or a child who can speak a word for freedom and humanity is bound to speak ... I hope every woman who can write will not be silent." Shortly after in June 1851, when she was 40, the first installment of Uncle Tom's Cabin
7900-473: The winter in Florence, where she wrote The Fortunes of Philippa Fairfax , the only book to be published in England but not in the United States. That winter Sara Crewe or What Happened at Miss Minchin's was published in the United States. She would go on to make Sara Crewe into a stage play, and later rewrite the story into A Little Princess . In 1888, Burnett returned to Manchester, where she leased
8000-505: Was tenth in 1913 and sixth in 1914 , and The Head of the House of Coombe was fourth in 1922 . Source: Little Lord Fauntleroy Little Lord Fauntleroy is a children's novel by Frances Hodgson Burnett . It was published as a serial in St. Nicholas Magazine from November 1885 to October 1886, then as a book by Scribner's (the publisher of St. Nicholas ) in 1886. The illustrations by Reginald B. Birch set fashion trends and
8100-401: Was "stout, rouged and unhealthy" - presuming that this would automatically impact the physical attraction - and believes Townsend needed Burnett to help with his acting career, and support him financially. Within months, in a letter to her sister, Burnett admitted the marriage was in trouble, describing Townsend as scarcely sane and hysterical. Thwaite argues that Townsend blackmailed Burnett into
8200-527: Was Stowe's assignment to refute them using evidence the Duchess provided, in Letter XVII Volume 1 of her travel memoir Sunny Memories of Foreign Lands . Stowe was criticized for her seeming defense of the clearances. In 1868, Stowe became one of the first editors of Hearth and Home magazine, one of several new publications appealing to women; she departed after a year. Stowe campaigned for
8300-632: Was a professor of Biblical Literature at the seminary. The two married at the Seminary on January 6, 1836. The Stowes had seven children, including twin daughters. The Congress passed the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850 , prohibiting assistance to fugitives and strengthening sanctions even in free states. At the time, Stowe had moved with her family to Brunswick, Maine , where her husband was now teaching at Bowdoin College . Their home near
8400-402: Was a velvet cut-away jacket and matching knee pants, worn with a fancy blouse and a large lace or ruffled collar. These suits appeared right after the publication of Burnett's story (1885) and were a major fashion for boys until after the turn of the 20th century. Many boys who did not wear an actual Fauntleroy suit wore suits with Fauntleroy elements, such as a fancy blouse or floppy bow. Only
8500-493: Was also influenced by the Lane Debates on Slavery . The biggest event ever to take place at Lane, it was the series of debates held on 18 days in February 1834, between colonization and abolition defenders, decisively won by Theodore Weld and other abolitionists. Elisabeth attended most of the debates. Her father and the trustees, afraid of more violence from anti-abolitionist whites, prohibited any further discussions of
8600-497: Was always softly slippered and generally full of animal spirits, she was able to deal in surprises, and she liked to do it. She would slip up behind a person who was deep in dreams and musings and fetch a war whoop that would jump that person out of his clothes. And she had other moods. Sometimes we would hear gentle music in the drawing-room and would find her there at the piano singing ancient and melancholy songs with infinitely touching effect. Modern researchers now speculate that at
8700-543: Was born, before returning to the United States to live in Washington, D.C. Burnett then began to write novels, the first of which ( That Lass o' Lowrie's ), was published to good reviews. Little Lord Fauntleroy was published in 1886 and made her a popular writer of children's fiction, although her romantic adult novels written in the 1890s were also popular. She wrote and helped to produce stage versions of Little Lord Fauntleroy and A Little Princess . Beginning in
8800-555: Was brand new, and she frequently exhausted herself with labor that she regarded as freshly created. Mark Twain , a neighbor of Stowe's in Hartford, recalled her last years in the following passage of his autobiography: Her mind had decayed, and she was a pathetic figure. She wandered about all the day long in the care of a muscular Irish woman. Among the colonists of our neighborhood the doors always stood open in pleasant weather. Mrs. Stowe entered them at her own free will, and as she
8900-475: Was buried in Roslyn Cemetery . During the serialization of Little Lord Fauntleroy in St. Nicholas in 1885, readers looked forward to new installments. The fashions in the book became popular, with velvet Fauntleroy suits being sold; other Fauntleroy merchandise included velvet collars, playing cards, and chocolates. Sentimental fiction was then the norm, and "rags to riches" stories were popular in
9000-602: Was constructed in 1883 which contained the Stowe Memorial stained glass window , created by Louis Comfort Tiffany . The Harriet Beecher Stowe House in Brunswick, Maine , is where Stowe lived when she wrote Uncle Tom's Cabin. Her husband was teaching theology at nearby Bowdoin College , and she regularly invited students from the college and friends to read and discuss the chapters before publication. Future Civil War general, and later Governor, Joshua Chamberlain
9100-428: Was honored by the governor of Florida as one of several northerners who had helped Florida's growth after the war. In addition to her writings inspiring tourists and settlers to the area, she helped establish a church and a school, and she helped promote oranges as a major state crop through her own orchards. The school she helped establish in 1870 was an integrated school in Mandarin for children and adults. This predated
9200-431: Was incorporated into British copyright law in 1911. In response to a second incident of pirating her material into a dramatic piece, she wrote The Real Little Lord Fauntleroy , which was produced on stage in London and on Broadway . The play went on to make her as much money as the book. In 1887, Burnett traveled to England for Queen Victoria 's Golden Jubilee , which became the first of yearly transatlantic trips from
9300-409: Was modeled on Burnett's younger son Vivian, and the autobiographical aspects of Little Lord Fauntleroy occasionally led to disparaging remarks from the press. After the publication of Little Lord Fauntleroy , Burnett's reputation as a writer of children's books was fully established. In 1888 she won a lawsuit in England over the dramatic rights to Little Lord Fauntleroy , establishing a precedent that
9400-626: Was modelled on the costumes which she tailored herself for her two sons, Vivian and Lionel. Polly Hovarth writes that Little Lord Fauntleroy "was the Harry Potter of his time and Frances Hodgson Burnett was as celebrated for creating him as J. K. Rowling is for Potter". During the serialisation in St. Nicholas magazine, readers looked forward to new installments. The fashions in the book became popular with velvet Lord Fauntleroy suits being sold, as well as other Fauntleroy merchandise such as velvet collars, playing cards, and chocolates. During
9500-434: Was paying for Vivian's education; keeping a house in Washington D.C. (Swan had moved out of the house to his own apartment); and keeping a home in London. As she had in the past, she turned to writing as a source of income and began to write A Lady of Quality . A Lady of Quality , published in 1896, was to become the first of a series of successful adult historical novels , which was followed in 1899 with In Connection with
9600-493: Was published in 1880; A Fair Barbarian in 1881; and Through One Administration in 1883. She wrote the play Esmerelda in 1881 while staying at the " Logan House " inn near Lake Lure, North Carolina ; it became the longest-running play on Broadway in the 19th century. However, as had happened earlier in Knoxville, she felt the pressure of maintaining a household, caring for children and a husband, and keeping to her writing schedule, which caused exhaustion and depression. Within
9700-556: Was published in serial form in the newspaper The National Era . She originally used the subtitle "The Man That Was a Thing", but it was soon changed to "Life Among the Lowly". Installments were published weekly from June 5, 1851, to April 1, 1852. For the newspaper serialization of her novel, Stowe was paid $ 400. Uncle Tom's Cabin was published in book form on March 20, 1852, by John P. Jewett with an initial print run of 5,000 copies. Each of its two volumes included three illustrations and
9800-426: Was published to good reviews, and the rights were sold for a British edition. Shortly after the publication of the book, she joined her husband in D.C., where she established a household and friends. She continued to write, becoming known as a rising young novelist. Despite the difficulties of raising a family and settling into a new city, Burnett began work on Haworth's , which was published in 1879, as well as writing
9900-526: Was reported in 1905 that Burnett was a semi-vegetarian . She had eliminated meat almost entirely from her diet. In 1907, she returned permanently to the United States, having become a citizen in 1905, and built a home, completed in 1908, in the Plandome Park section of Plandome Manor on Long Island outside New York City. Her son Vivian was employed in the publishing business, and at his request, she agreed to be an editor for Children's Magazine . Over
10000-412: Was then a student at the college and later described the setting. "On these occasions," Chamberlain noted, "a chosen circle of friends, mostly young, were favored with the freedom of her house, the rallying point being, however, the reading before publication, of the successive chapters of her Uncle Tom's Cabin , and the frank discussion of them." In 2001, Bowdoin College purchased the house, together with
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