The Old Peabody Pew is written by Kate Douglas Wiggin. The story begins with the Dorcas Society, being female and possessed of notions regarding comfort and beauty, generally disapproved of making any impious alterations in a tabernacle, chapel, temple, or other building used for worship. This sentiment had been maintained for a quarter of a century but was especially strong in the old Tory Hill Meeting House. Every pew in the old Meeting House was scrubbed by members of the Ladies' Christian Temperance Society. "When men lose their wives, they lose their wits," said the Widow Buzzell. "If there's anything duller than cookin' three meals a day for yourself, and eatin' them by yourself, I'd like to know it!". A bird without a song stood in for Nancy Peabody's love each year. Since that gloomy day in November when Justin said goodbye, the months had seemingly never ended. If she had openly pledged to him, she could have waited twice ten years.
Kate Douglas Wiggin was an American educator, author, and composer who lived from September 28, 1856, until August 24, 1923. She also created collections of children's songs in addition to writing children's books, most famously the classic Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm. In San Francisco, she established the city's first free kindergarten in 1878. (the Silver Street Free Kindergarten). She also started a kindergarten teacher training program in the 1880s with her sister. In an era when kids were often seen as cheap labor, Kate Wiggin dedicated her whole life to the welfare of kids. Wiggin traveled to California to research kindergarten instruction. She started teaching in San Francisco with the help of her sister Nora, and the two were crucial in establishing more than 60 kindergartens for the underprivileged in Oakland and San Francisco. She relocated from California to New York, and because she was out of kindergarten assignments, she focused on literature. Her submissions of The Story of Patsy and The Bird's Christmas Carol were immediately accepted by Houghton, Mifflin & Co. She had storytelling ability in addition to being a good singer, guitarist, and composer of settings for her poems. She was a skilled orator as well.
