Harriet Beecher Stowe Center
77 Forest Street
Hartford, CT 06105
860-522-9258
info@stowecenter.org
June 3, 2020
“This horror, this nightmare abomination! Can it be in my country?”
Stowe wrote those words in 1852 to fellow writer and abolitionist Eliza Cabot Follen; they feel so present now. The needless deaths of George Floyd, Ahmaud Arbery, Breonna Taylor and far too many others show us the devastating and appalling consequences of racism and white supremacy.
Stowe’s response to the horror of slavery was powerful and inspiring. Stowe used her writing to cultivate empathy and understanding among her white readers and in doing so she galvanized a movement. Fortunately, such courage and inspiration isn’t restricted to the past. All around us, individuals are taking to the streets, petitioning their elected officials—and yes—picking up their pens to demand justice.
Still, we ask, if over 150 years ago Stowe and her generation stood up against the evil of slavery, why must protestors today face tear gas and rubber bullets to stop the devaluation and dehumanization of Black lives by the public institutions that are supposed to serve them? Why have Black Americans disproportionately borne the economic and health consequences of the coronavirus pandemic?
The answer is, of course, that that ending slavery was not the same as ending racism.
As an organization that places Stowe’s story in the service of social justice and positive change, the Harriet Beecher Stowe Center recognizes that Stowe herself held racist views and saw Black Americans as lesser. We confront such facts, not to demonize Stowe or repudiate her contributions, but because we have been shown, again and again, that unseen and unacknowledged racism persists and festers. This is equally true when racism goes unnoticed in our history books, our institutions, and in ourselves.
The video that captured George Floyd’s death has forced us to see. Let our eyes and hearts remain open.
Respectfully,
Briann Greenfield
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Isabella Holmes Beecher Hooker (1822-1907)
An ardent member of the woman’s suffrage movement, Isabella Holmes Beecher Hooker joined in the cause along with Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony.
Isabella was the first child of Lyman Beecher and his second wife, Harriet Porter Beecher.
Isabella began her education at Catharine Beecher’s Hartford Female Seminary and lived with her sister Mary Perkins. In 1841 she married John Hooker, a descendant of Thomas Hooker, the founder of Hartford. John Hooker was a lawyer and an abolitionist.
In the early 1860s Isabella got involved in the woman’s suffrage movement. Isabella joined Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony as a member of the National Woman’s Suffrage Association in 1869. She was a founding member of the Connecticut Woman’s Suffrage Association. Isabella’s ideas of equality were influenced by John Stuart Mills’ On Liberty and the Subjection of Women.
In 1871, Isabella organized the annual convention of the National Woman’s Suffrage Association in Washington D.C. and presented her argument before the Committee on the Judiciary of the United States Senate. Her husband, John Hooker, believed in his wife and supported her activities. He helped Isabella draft a bill to the Connecticut Legislature giving married women the same property rights as their husbands. The bill passed in 1877. Isabella annually submitted a bill granting women the right to vote, but it did not pass in her lifetime.
Due to inclement weather, the Harriet Beecher Stowe Center is closed today, Monday, December 2.