When Old South, the site of mass protest meetings in Revolutionary Boston, was slated for demolition a hundred years later, a group of women bought the building (but not the land) to protect it. Philanthropist Mary Tileston Hemenway (1820-94) then contributed more than half the sum needed to preserve it, becoming an early leader in historic preservation.
Phillis Wheatley (ca. 1753-84), the first African American poet to be published in book form, was a member of Old South. While still a child, she was purchased as a slave by the Wheatley family. Her poetry reflects her love of freedom: “Should you…wonder from whence my love of Freedom sprung…I, young in life, was snatched from Afric’s fancy’d happy seat…such, such my case. And can I then but pray, Others may never feel tyrannic sway?” Phillis Wheatley is one of three women chosen to be portrayed in the Boston Women’s Memorial. An exhibit depicting her life is permanently displayed here.
