Mary Rotch
A leading intellectual and deep religious thinker, Mary Rotch (1777-1848) remained true to her belief in the Light Within.
Marian Shaw Smith
Marian Shaw Smith (1866-1913) sailed the world’s oceans as a whaling captain’s wife, log keeper, photographer, navigator, correspondent, and business partner.
Elizabeth Barstow Stoddard
A distant cousin of Nathaniel Hawthorne, prolific writer Elizabeth Stoddard (1823-1902) was born in Mattapoisett.
Elizabeth Taber
Known as “Marion’s Fairy Godmother,” Elizabeth Sprague Pitcher Taber (1791-1888) became the town’s most significant benefactress.
Mary Ann Hathaway Tripp
The first American woman to visit China and one of the first to circumnavigate the globe, Fairhaven’s Mary Ann Hathaway Tripp (1810-1906) sailed with her husband, Captain Lemuel Carver Tripp, on several merchant voyages between 1833 and 1845.
Florence Waite
The humble philanthropist Florence Waite (1861-1946) left the bulk of her estate worth more than $7.5 million in today’s dollars to be carefully distributed among more than 20 hometown organizations, many of which she had helped for decades.
Helen Worthing Webster
A pioneering doctor and champion of physical activity for women, New Bedford’s Helen Worthing Webster (1837-1904) graduated from New England Female Medical College in Boston as a Doctor of Medicine.
Charlotte White
Charlotte White (1775?-1861), born to a Wampanoag Native American and a former slave, connected with the Native American and African American communities, worked for poor relief, and practiced folk medicine and midwifery during her lifetime in Westport.
Sylvia Ann Howland Green Wilks
Like mother, not so much like daughter. Sylvia Ann Howland Green Wilks (1871-1951), daughter of infamously miserly Hetty Green, willed the bulk of her inheritance to libraries, hospitals and other charities. Although she developed many of her mother’s idiosyncrasies, Sylvia’s final philanthropy allowed most of her mother’s fortune to ultimately work for good.
Betsey B. Winslow
A New Bedford teacher for more than 20 years, Betsey Baldwin Winslow (1836-1925) was elected to the New Bedford School Committee, serving in that capacity for nearly 39 years – the longest serving member in the history of the School Department.
