Harriette Woods was born in Andover, MA, in 1815. Her father was a professor and later president of Andover Theological Seminary. She began writing as a child and was published in The Puritan and Youth’s Companion before she was in her teens. She attended the Abbot Female Seminary in Catskill, NY, and married Abijah Richardson Baker in 1835. A graduate of Andover Theological Seminary, he was a teacher at Phillips Academy. The couple moved to Medford, MA, and several other locations in the state including Dorchester, where they lived on Brent Street. The mother of five sons, Harriette wrote dozens of books for children. Their themes tended to be religious in nature. Her most successful work was Tim, The Scissors-Grinder, which was published in 1861, sold half a million copies, and was translated into a number of languages under one of her pseudonyms, Mrs. Madeline Leslie. After becoming a widow in 1876, Harriette moved to Brooklyn, NY, where she died in 1893.
