The enthusiasm was great; eight thousand dollars was soon pledged and other donations were made. It was decided to hold a Sanitary Fair in Dubuque, and Mrs. Livermore was engaged to speak in different towns throughout the State to interest the people in it. When the fair was held, sixty thousand dollars was cleared. After that, Mary Livermore was never again afraid to speak before a large audience. By her lectures she raised hundreds of thousands of dollars for the hospital work.
At the close of the war, people were so anxious to hear Mrs. Livermore that she became a regular public lecturer, traveling from place to place and lecturing always before crowded houses. Her eloquence has been equaled by few modern speakers, and undoubtedly she was the foremost of women orators.
Before the war, Mrs. Livermore had been opposed to woman suffrage, but life in the army caused her to change her views on that question. She saw that, under existing political and social conditions, women could never hope to complete reforms until they possessed the right to vote. She was also devoted to the cause of temperance, serving for ten years as President of the Women's Christian Temperance Union of Massachusetts. All this while she was writing articles for magazines, and at the age of seventy-five Mrs. Livermore produced a book of seven hundred pages, entitled The Story of My Life.
A bust of Mrs. Livermore, made by the sculptor, Annie Whitney, was presented to the Shurtleff School in Boston by the Alumnae Association of that institution. It stands opposite that of Lucy Stone, which was the first bust of a woman ever accepted by the city of Boston for its schools.
Mrs. Livermore continued in public work, while living at her beautiful home in Melrose, Massachusetts, until May 23, 1905, when she passed away at the age of eighty-four.
CLARA BARTON
CLARA BARTON
(1821-1912)