Description:

Howe Julia

Julia Ward Howe Boosts Paul Revere's House For the Sake of Preservation

 

3pp AMS inscribed overall and signed by American writer Julia Ward Howe (1819-1910) as "Julia Ward Howe." at the top of the third page. In very good to near fine condition. With expected paper folds, isolated light soiling, and two tiny holes punched through the same spot in all three sheets not really affecting text. Each page measures 5.625" x 9." Comes with typed transcription.

 

Julia Ward Howe sent this undated signed manuscript to Boston newspaper editors to encourage fundraising for the preservation of the Paul Revere House. The draft may even have been an editorial later published in the Boston Evening Transcript.

 

"The debts which we owe to the Past we must now pay to the Future. In view of this fact we hail it as a happy augury that patriotic individuals today are so largely bestirring themselves to preserve the traces, rapidly disappearing, of the men and women whose public services in by gone time have entitled them to the lasting remembrance and gratitude of their fellow countrymen.

 

Prominent among these benefactors of our early history is Paul Revere, whose wonderful ride, celebrated by Longfellow, is so identified with the beginning of our struggle for national independence. It is greatly to be hoped that the subscription now in progress for the purchase and restoration of his house in North Square may  reach the sum required for that purpose, some thirty thousand dollars.

 

With a monument in recognition of public service, standing in the midst of our 'Little Italy', will serve a double purpose. It will attest our gratitude to the eminent man who once made it his home. It will also give our foreign guests and future citizens a lesson in our national history, and in the political faith to which it pledges the generations to come.

 

Julia Ward Howe."

 

Howe was an appropriate contemporary mouthpiece for the Paul Revere Memorial Association, the fundraising arm of the preservation campaign. Her 1861 poem the “Battle Hymn of the Republic” had galvanized the Union war effort and increased patriotism. In this piece, Howe argued that early American landmarks should not only be preserved because of their connection to important events or historical figures, but also because they served as symbolic teaching tools to immigrants. Howe makes this argument explicit when she mentions the ethnic North End neighborhood where the Paul Revere House was located. Thus the manuscript makes a connection between two significant turn-of-the-century trends: the Colonial Revival Movement and increased immigration.

 

In part through the efforts of Howe, money was raised to purchase, restore, and preserve the Paul Revere House. In 1908, Revere's house at 19 North Square was opened as one of the nation's first historic house museums.

 

Julia Ward Howe, the scholar, playwright, abolitionist, feminist, and social reformer, is best known for her poetry. After the Civil War, Howe became increasingly active in the women's suffrage movement. In March 1895, Howe was a leading member of many feminist organizations, including the Association of American Women and the General Federation of Women's Clubs. Her memoirs recapitulated important events in her extraordinary life.

 

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