#over the river and through the wood

NOVEMBER 30 - LYDIA MARIA CHILD

Remembered for penning the popular children’s poem “Over the River and Through the Wood”, Lydia Maria Child often shocked audiences from the 1830s to the 1960s with her extremely liberal views. She called for the emancipation of slaves without any compensation to slaveholders, believing that women could not make significant progress in their rights until slavery was abolished.

Child’s 1833 work An Appeal in Favor of That Class of Americans Called Africans is said to be the first anti-slavery book published in the United States. She also wrote fictional short stories in support of her anti-slavery beliefs, often exploring how sexual exploitation affected both the enslaved and the slaveholder’s family. The more she delved into these concepts, the more negative reactions she received from readers.

This was not, however, Child’s first taste of controversy. In the mid-1820s, she published a historical romance novel entitled Hobomok: A Tale of Early Times, writing under the anonymous pseudonym “an American”. The book caused quite a stir in the literary community due to its central relationship - an interracial marriage between a white woman and a Native American man.

Decades later, Child would publicly endorse Native American rights, compiling various pamphlets throughout the 1860s. One of her pieces, An Appeal for the Indians, called upon government officials and religious leaders to make a difference, leading to the establishment of the US Board of Indian Commissioners in 1869.