Literary Site: Harriett Beecher Stowe Home - Hartford, CT

Harriett Beecher Stowe Home

Hartford, CT

GPS: N41° 46.002; W072° 42.023

Short Description: 

The Hartford, CT home of Harriett Beecher Stowe is located at 77 Forest Street in an area once known as Nook Farm.

Long Description:

Harriett Beecher was born in Litchfield, CT on June 14, 1811. When she was 21 she moved to Cincinnati, Ohio where her father was president of Lane Theological Seminary. In 1836, she married a professor at the Seminary, Calvin Ellis Stowe.

The family moved to Brunswick, ME when Calvin took a position a Bowdoin College. It was here she wrote, in 1851, the widely read, anti-slavery novel, Uncle Tom's Cabin, which is credited with inspiring a more fervent abolitionist movement in the north.

After her husband retired they moved to the writers colony at Nook Farm in Hartford, CT, where she continued to write. In 1873, she moved into into a brick Victorian Gothic cottage-style house on Forest Street where She remained for 23 years until her death on July 1, 1896. While in Hartford she wrote some of her best known works including: The American Woman's Home (1869), Lady Byron Vindicated (1871) and Pogunuc People (1878).

A pair of plaques on her home are inscribed:

HARRIETT BEECHER STOWE

DAUGHTER OF 

THE REVEREND LYMAN AND ROXANNA FOOTE BEECHER

BORN LITCHFIELD CONNECTICUT 14 JUNE 1811

MARRIED AT CINCINNATI OHIO 6 JANUARY 1836

TO CALVIN ELLIS STOWE

WROTE "UNCLE TOM'S CABIN" AT BRUNSWICK, MAINE IN 1851

RESIDED IN THIS HOUSE FROM 1873

UNTIL HER DEATH 1 JULY 1896

"AS COLUMBUS SOUGHT AN OLD CONTINENT AND DISCOVERED

A NEW ONE SO HARRIETT BEECHER STOWE MEANT TO WRITE

AN ARGUMENT ON AN OLD THEME AND SUCCEEDED IN

WRITING AN IMMORTAL CLASSIC"

WILLIAM LYON PHELPS

and

THIS TABLET PLACED BY 

THE HARTFORD COLONY

NATIONAL SOCIETY

NEW ENGLAND WOMEN

13 JUNE 1955

Wikipedia list the following books written by Harriett Beecher Stowe:

The Mayflower; or, Sketches of Scenes and Characters Among the Descendants of the Pilgrims (1834)
Mark Meriden (1841)
Uncle Tom's Cabin (1852)
A Key to Uncle Tom's Cabin (1853)
Dred, A Tale of the Great Dismal Swamp (1856)
The Minister's Wooing (1859)
Agnes of Sorrento (1862) (reading online)
The Pearl of Orr's Island (1862)
The Chimney Corner (1866) (chapters published in Atlantic Monthly Volume 18)
The American Woman's Home (1869) (with Catherine Beecher) (see summary and links to the book here)
Old Town Folks (1869)
Little Pussy Willow (1870)
Lady Byron Vindicated (1870)
My Wife and I (1871)
Pink and White Tyranny (1871)
Woman in Sacred History (1873)
Palmetto Leaves (1873)
We and Our Neighbors (1875)
Poganuc People (1878)
The Poor Life (1890)
He's Coming Tomorrow (unknown)

As Christopher Crowfield

House and Home Papers (1865)
Little Foxes (1866)
The Harriet Beecher Stowe Center was established to preserve and interpret Harriett Beecher Stowe's home and historic collections, to promote discussion of her life and work, and to inspire commitment to social justice and positive change.

The home is open by guided tour.
Monday-Saturday: 9:30 AM - 5:00 PM
Sundays: Noon - 5:00 PM
Last tour steps off at 4:30 PM
Open M.L. King Day, Presidents' Day, Memorial Day, Labor Day and Columbus Day.
Closed Tuesdays from January to March, New Year's Day, Easter Sunday, July 4, Thanksgiving Day, Christmas Eve and Christmas Day.