Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1907-07-12

HARTFORD, Conn, July 7. 9O7.,
There used to be a. colony of brilliant .it-
erary people here but death and removals
have abolished 1t. AS was customary In
the early settlements Of New England,
farm was reserved for the minister; and at
Hartford it was located upon high ground
west of the city. The land descended from
the Rev. Thomas Hooker, founder of Con-
necticut, through successive generations, to
John Hooker, a lawyer and for many
years the reporter of the decisions Of the
supreme court of the state. AS the city
spread out in that direction Nook Farm"
as it was called, was ultimately cut up Into
villa sites and a group of congenial spirits
bought them and built homes upon them
Jonn Hooker, the owner, was the husband
of Isabella Beecher Hooker, a woman of
unusual intellectual attachments and for
many years a leader in social events and
in the national womans suffrage movement.
She was spiritualist, also, and after her
husbands death was accustomed to COM
mune with him daily. She kept his room
and his books he left them; she kept his
place at the table; laid the morning paper
where he was accustomed to find it during
his lifetime, and, until she died few
months ago, he just much alive to
her he ever was. 1t was a beautiful
realization of her spiritual belief. They left
a son, DIR. Edward B. Hooker, homeo-
pathic physician of Hartford, and a daugh-
ter, Mrs John Calvin Day of New York.
Notable Neighbors.
The adjoining farm belonged to Judge
Gillette, who was a member of the United
States Senate along In the fifties, and was
one of the leaders of the free soil par,J
/, was the father of William Gillette, the
well-known actor and impersonator of the
immortal Sherlock Holmes. Gillette was
born and educated here and still owns the
old homestead, where his father died ir
1879. His sister married brother of
Charles Dudley Warner, who occupied an
adjoining villa, where he wrote the most
charming of all books rural lie, My
Summer in Garden" His home and its
surroundings are described in that little
volume with delicate grace. Mrs. Warner
still lives there. Prof Richard Burton, the
poet and philosopher. now of the University
of Minnesota, was their next door neighbor
for long time, and Harriet Beecher Stowe
spent the last half century OIL her life in
the next house.
Her husband used to preach here, and
her son, Rev. Charles E. Stowe, now
breaches at simsbury, a little village in the
neighborhood. Mrs. Stowe made a great
deal of money from Uncle Toms Cabin"
The Minister'S Wooing" and other of her
stories, and long after the copyrights ex-
pired her publishers issued new editions and
paid her royalties out of a sense Of honor
without any legal obligation. This fact
ought to be we'll advertised. We hear so
much about injustice suffered by writers;
every time an dulNOT Is SWlnQleO out OF a
few dollars the circumstances are published
to the ends of the earth, but the numerous
cases in which moral obligations are vol
unfairly fulfilled in an honorable manner
are seldom mentioned. When Mrs. Stowe
died, in 1886. she left a small estate to her
two unmarried daughters-this home in
Hartford, an orange grove in Florida and
about $4,000 in cash.
The Beechers and Others.
The Beechers, including their famous
brother Henry Ward. were born in the
neighboring village of Lichfeld, where their
father the Rev Lyman Beecher, was pastor
of the Congregational Church nearly all his
lifetime, and managed to educate two sons
and four daughters upon a salary that
never exceeded $500 a year, and most Of
the time was only $40O-all of which proves
that money was not essential to fame or
usefulness in those days.
Another Of the Beecher girls, Catherine,
who, l believe, was the eldest, was princi-
pal of Hartford Female Seminary nearly
all her life, and Mrs. Sigourney. the poet,
was one of her teachers. The latter taught
school in Hartford for more than half a
century, and although her verses are not SO
much admired in these days as they were
when they were written, you will, neverthe-
less, find them bound in blue and gold upon
the bookshelves in all the old-fashioned
libraries, and they breathe deep poetic
sentiment in a graceful diction that is often
equal to that of Mrs. Browning.
Rose Terry Cooke, sister of the late Gen.
Alfred II. Terry, was another Hartford
poet. Edmund Clarence Stedman, who
abandoned the muse for the stock market
was born here. Henry c. Worth, who
wrote Marching Thro' Georgia" and other
war songs. lived and died here In 1872, and
his grave in Spring Grove cemetery is deco
rated by the Grand Army Of the Republic
with solemn ceremonies on Memorial day.
Bishop Doane Q799-1S59) wrote that much
loved hymn Softly Now the Light OF Day"
when he was a tutor at Trinity College.
Emma Willard Q1S7-1S10) wrote Rocked
In the Cradle of the Deep when she was
teaching school in Hartford, before she
founded her college for women at Troy.
Emma Willard and Mary Lyon were the
foremost and most prominent leaders in the
movement for the higher education of
women, and their statues properly appear
in the hall of fame in the University of the
City of New York.
Mary Abigail Dodge, better known as Gail
Hamilton, was another Hartford school
teacher, and there many men and
women in this city today who recited gram
mar and rhetoric to her in the high school
fifty years ago.
Old Home of Mark Twain.
Mr. Samuel L. Clemens. who has recently
received the degree Of doctor of laws from
oxford University, and has since been the
guest of the King Of England, made his
home in Hartford for many years, and his
wit and humor in those days was very
much superior to what he is giving us at
present. He then had such high regard
for his reputation that he would have as
sassinated any publisher who printed such
drivel as has recently appeared over his
signature in the North American Review
and other periodicals. He would have in
| stantly repudiated as idiotic such jokes as
! nave been telegraphed across the ocean
| since his recent arrival in England Mr.
Clemens was formerly the idol of Hartford.
| His first book. 'Innocents Abroad" was
| published here; "Roughing It. and "Huckle-
berry Flnn ana other OF his best works
| were written in the pretty cottage on
! Pennington avenue alongside the homes of
| Mrs Stowe and Charles Dudley Warner.
| his most intimate friends OF former davs
still live here. The Rev. Dr. Joseph II
| Twichell of this city was his closest chum
| and adviser. and was the Harris of his
"A Tramp Abroad" but after the death of
| Mrs Clemens and his daughter Mark