Editing Dorothea Lynde Dix
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|image = dorotheadix.jpg | |image = dorotheadix.jpg | ||
|image_size = 228px | |image_size = 228px | ||
− | |caption = | + | |caption = Thomas Kirkbride, M.D. From the collections of the National Library of Medicine. |
|birth_date = April 12, 1802(1802-04-12) | |birth_date = April 12, 1802(1802-04-12) | ||
|birth_place = Hampton, Maine | |birth_place = Hampton, Maine | ||
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She not only wished to gain personal independence for herself, but also to support and educate her two brothers. The small house in which the school was opened soon became overcrowded and was exchanged for her grandmother's residence, know as the "Dix Mansion." The high reputation which the school acquired attracted pupils from prominent families in Boston and elsewhere throughout New England. With the rapid development of her school, Miss Dix gradually assumed many arduous duties: she managed the household, taught in the day and boarding school, nursed her aged grandmother, and finally from a lively sense of duty to the poor oped a charity school. These labors proved too much for her strength, and at the end of six years her health failed. In 1827, when the Dix School was suspended because of her disability, she entered the family of William Ellery Channing, D. D., as governess and spent several successive summers at Portsmouth, R.I. | She not only wished to gain personal independence for herself, but also to support and educate her two brothers. The small house in which the school was opened soon became overcrowded and was exchanged for her grandmother's residence, know as the "Dix Mansion." The high reputation which the school acquired attracted pupils from prominent families in Boston and elsewhere throughout New England. With the rapid development of her school, Miss Dix gradually assumed many arduous duties: she managed the household, taught in the day and boarding school, nursed her aged grandmother, and finally from a lively sense of duty to the poor oped a charity school. These labors proved too much for her strength, and at the end of six years her health failed. In 1827, when the Dix School was suspended because of her disability, she entered the family of William Ellery Channing, D. D., as governess and spent several successive summers at Portsmouth, R.I. | ||
− | In 1830 she went to the West Indies with the Channings, and in this benignant tropical climate, surrounded by new and luxuriant vegetation, entertained by unfamiliar customs, and fascinated by the novelties of a new world, she found complete mental relaxation. Various branches of natural history attracted her attention, everything new in her experience receiving searching investigation and being catalogued in her memory, if not in her voluminous note-books. Geological formations, landscapes, flora, fauna, harbors, shores and ocean-currents, in short, all the novel phenomena within her conscious horizon, engaged her critical interest now that she had time and opportunity to indulge her natural thirst for information. The keen | + | In 1830 she went to the West Indies with the Channings, and in this benignant tropical climate, surrounded by new and luxuriant vegetation, entertained by unfamiliar customs, and fascinated by the novelties of a new world, she found complete mental relaxation. Various branches of natural history attracted her attention, everything new in her experience receiving searching investigation and being catalogued in her memory, if not in her voluminous note-books. Geological formations, landscapes, flora, fauna, harbors, shores and ocean-currents, in short, all the novel phenomena within her conscious horizon, engaged her critical interest now that she had time and opportunity to indulge her natural thirst for information. The keen discrimation shown in her reports and the value of the specimens which she collected elicited letters of appreciation form Audubon and Silliman. |
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Miss Dix's mother and grandmother both died during her stay in England, and in 1837 business interests necessitated her return to America. Her health, though improved, was not firmly re-established, but as her brothers were successfully established in business, and the funds she had accumulated in teaching, increased by an inheritance from her grandmother's estate, yielded an income sufficient for her support, she no longer obliged to keep up her school. | Miss Dix's mother and grandmother both died during her stay in England, and in 1837 business interests necessitated her return to America. Her health, though improved, was not firmly re-established, but as her brothers were successfully established in business, and the funds she had accumulated in teaching, increased by an inheritance from her grandmother's estate, yielded an income sufficient for her support, she no longer obliged to keep up her school. |