Abby Maria Hemenway

VT History

Abby Maria Hemenway was born October 7, 1828, in my hometown of Ludlow, Vermont. At the age of fourteen, she was teaching in the local school district. She completed her education at the Black River Academy, in Ludlow, and then headed west to Michigan to continue her career in teaching. She became homesick and returned to Vermont. Soon after her return, Abby realized that in her 3 year absence many of the keepers of local anecdotes and traditions of the early settlements had passed away; their stories going to the grave without being recorded. She knew many people who had written poems that deserved to be preserved. The result of her efforts to collect these treasures was, The Poets and Poetry of Vermont, published in 1858. The hard work that Abby put into collecting the material for this book did not go unnoticed, and she won the admiration of men and women statewide. At the earnest request of many prominent men of that day and age, she began her Vermont Quarterly Gazetteer - "A Historical Magazine Embracing A Digest of The History of Each Town, Civil, Educational, Religious, Geological and Literary." Her original thought was to complete fourteen quarterlies in a magazine format: one to be devoted to each county starting with Addison, the rest to follow in alhabetical order. She had complete five issues in this manner, before the Civil War interrupted her work. I believe the only county that she did not finish was her own, Windsor County.

The USGenWeb Project has been transcribing exerpts from the Gazetteer for the individual town histories. Below are links to some of them. Franklin County has done an excellent job of laying out their pages and is worth checking out.

If you are not on this page by accident and are truly interested in Vermont history it would be worthwhile to visit the local library to see what books they have by Abby.

Dennis Jay Hall of Vergennes edited and published "The Vermont Historical Gazetteer Rediscovered". It and other books by or about Abby Maria Hemenway are available at Barnes & Noble or Amazon.com

Here are some links to other interesting sites.

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