Lydia Jane Wheeler Peirson
{{short description|American poet}}
Lydia Jane Wheeler Peirson (1802–1862; sometimes spelled Pierson) was an American poet, nicknamed "the forest minstrel".{{cite book|last=Small|first=Judy Jo|title=Positive As Sound: Emily Dickinson's Rhyme|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=XXZZ6HfkFzgC&pg=PA34|date=1 May 2010|publisher=University of Georgia Press|isbn=978-0-8203-3464-6|pages=34–}}
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| quote ="Like a great majority of women, she had too little knowledge of business to enable her to realize the pecuniary recompense that was due her labors. She has been, for a long time, a contributor to papers that have a wide circulation, yet has seldom received more than the paper and an occasional volume sent the editor for review, as compensation.— The proceeds of one volume of her poems, she donated to a theological seminary; for the other she received nothing. The publishers found rapid sale for the work, but soon after its issue were burnt out, and a great share of the edition destroyed. They maintained that they had received only enough to compensate them for their expense, and gave her nothing."{{cite book|editor=M. B. Bateham & S. D. Harris|title=THE OHIO CULTIVATOR: A SEMI-MONTHLY JOURNAL, DEVOTED TO THE IMPROVEMENT OF AGRICULTURE AND HORTICULTURE, AND THE PROMOTION OF DOMESTIC INDUSTRY: ILLUSTRATED WITH ENGLAVING OF FARM BUILDINGS, IMPLEMENTS, DOMESTIC ANIMALS, Erc.|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=nrIYWV54UpYC&pg=PA46|edition=Public domain|volume=XI|year=1855|pages=46–}}
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Early years
Born in Middletown, Connecticut, she was the daughter to William Wheeler. She developed an aptitude for literary works at an early age, writing and singing verses before age 12. These first songs were about God and nature. She memorized entire books, including The Shipwreck, The Lady of the Lake, Lalla-Rookh, The Bride of Abydos, and The Corsair.{{cite book|last=Hale|first=Sarah Josepha Buell|title=Woman's Record, Or, Sketches of All Distinguished Women: From the Creation to A.D. 1854 : Arranged in Four Eras : with Selections from Female Writers of Every Age|url=https://archive.org/details/womansrecordorsk00hale_0|edition=Public domain|year=1855|publisher=Harper & Bros.|pages=[https://archive.org/details/womansrecordorsk00hale_0/page/769 769]–}} At the age of 16, she moved with her parents to Canandaigua, New York and married Oliver Peirson two years later.
Career
With her husband, Peirson moved to the western portion of Liberty Township, Tioga County, Pennsylvania in 1821.{{cite book|last=Sexton|first=John L.|title=An Outline History of Tioga and Bradford Counties in Pennsylvania, Chemung, Steuben, Tioga, Tompkins and Schuyler in New York: By Townships, Villages, Boro's and Cities|url=https://archive.org/details/bub_gb_kWlCAAAAYAAJ|edition=Public domain|year=1885|publisher=Gazette Company|pages=[https://archive.org/details/bub_gb_kWlCAAAAYAAJ/page/n42 39]–}} Suffering from loneliness and seclusion at their rural home in the woods of the Allegheny Mountains,{{cite book|last1=Peirson|first1=Lydia Jane|last2=Schneck|first2=Benjamin Shroder|title=The forest minstrel [verse] ed. by B.S. Schneck|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=N9wHAAAAQAAJ&pg=PR5|edition=Public domain|year=1846|pages=vii–}} she began to write. For many years, her children were financially dependent on her efforts. She was a prolific author, chiefly for magazines and newspapers, her published poems filling more than a thousand common octavo pages. Though Peirson wrote more prose than poems, her prose papers were not collected. Her writings were often about nature. Peirson published two volumes of poems: "Forest Leaves," in 1846 and " The Forest Minstrel," in 1847. In 1849, she edited the Lancaster Literary Gazette; she was also the chief writer for the Ladies' Garland, a periodical for women which flourished in the 1840s.{{cite book|last=Mott|first=Frank Luther|title=A History of American Magazines: 1741-1850|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=TIN35IEDPX8C&pg=PA672|date=January 1930|publisher=Harvard University Press|isbn=978-0-674-39550-3|pages=672–}} She contributed prose and verse to the Southern Literary Magazine and The New Real.{{cite book|last=Hart|first=John Seely|title=A Manual of American Literature: A Text-book for Schools and Colleges|url=https://archive.org/details/bub_gb_ark0AQAAMAAJ|edition=Public domain|year=1872|publisher=Eldredge & Brother|pages=[https://archive.org/details/bub_gb_ark0AQAAMAAJ/page/n209 210]–}} In 1853, Peirson settled in Adrian, Michigan where she died in 1862.{{cite book|last1=Wilson|first1=James Grant|last2=Fiske|first2=John|title=Appleton's Cyclopædia of American Biography|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=smnhAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA703|edition=Public domain|year=1888|publisher=D. Appleton|pages=703–}}
References
{{reflist|30em}}
=Bibliography=
- {{Source-attribution|S. J. B. Hale's " Woman's Record, Or, Sketches of All Distinguished Women: From the Creation to A.D. 1854 : Arranged in Four Eras : with Selections from Female Writers of Every Age" (1855)}}
- {{Source-attribution|M. B. Bateham & S. D. Harris's "THE OHIO CULTIVATOR: A SEMI-MONTHLY JOURNAL, DEVOTED TO THE IMPROVEMENT OF AGRICULTURE AND HORTICULTURE, AND THE PROMOTION OF DOMESTIC INDUSTRY: ILLUSTRATED WITH ENGLAVING OF FARM BUILDINGS, IMPLEMENTS, DOMESTIC ANIMALS, Erc." (1855)}}
- {{Source-attribution|J. L. Sexton's " An Outline History of Tioga and Bradford Counties in Pennsylvania, Chemung, Steuben, Tioga, Tompkins and Schuyler in New York: By Townships, Villages, Boro's and Cities" (1885)}}
- {{Source-attribution|L. J. Peirson's & B. S. Schneck's " The forest minstrel [verse] ed. by B.S. Schneck" (1846)}}
- {{Source-attribution|J. S. Hart's "A Manual of American Literature: A Text-book for Schools and Colleges" (1872)}}
- {{Source-attribution|J. G. Wilson's & J. Fiske's " Appleton's Cyclopædia of American Biography" (1888)}}
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Peirson, Lydia Jane Wheeler}}
Category:People from Middletown, Connecticut