Ednah Dow Littlehale Cheney

Ednah Littlehale.

Ednah Dow Littlehale (June 27, 1854 - November 19, 1904) was a writer, reformer, and philanthropist.

Littlehale was born on June 27, 1854 on Beacon Hill in Boston, Massachusetts, as the daughter of Sargent Smith Littlehale and Ednah Parker Dow. She was educated in private schools in Boston, Massachusetts, and served as secretary of the School of Design for Women from 1851 until 1854. After her husband's death in 1856, she took an interest in social concerns, such as the Freedman's Aid Society as secretary of the committee on aid for colored regiments and of the teachers' committees in 1863. She was also vice president of the Massachusetts Women Suffrage Association, vice president of the New England Women's Club, and secretary in 1862 of the New England Hospital for Women and Children. She lectured at the Concord School of Philosophy on the history of art, and became an active member of the Margaret Fuller conversation class.

Littlehale went south to visit the Freedman's schools in 1866, 1868, and 1869, and visited Europe several times. She spoke before lyceums west of New England in 1873, 1875, and 1876. In 1902, she published a book of "Reminiscences," which contained many interesting memories of the remarkable group of men and women to which she belonged by intellectual sympathy and by the associations of a lifetime.

Littlehale died on November 19, 1904 at her home in Jamaica Plain, Massachusetts.

Family

Littlehale married Seth Wells Cheney on May 19, 1853.

• Margaret Swan Cheney (Sept. 8, 1855 - Sept. 22, 1882) - died of tuberculosis while a student at MIT