William Lloyd Garrison, Samuel Eliot Morison, Lucy Stone, Abigail Adams, and Phillis Wheatley in Boston, Massachusetts

The first seated statue on Commonwealth Avenue Mall - a long walkway between the two sides of Commonwealth Avenue where many people sit on benches eating and drinking or merely relaxing - was of the noted journalist and abolitionist William Lloyd Garrison (1805-79), about whom I shall say more in my post on Garrison in Newburyport, North Shore, Massachusetts.

The bronze statue was sculpted in 1885 by Olin Levi Warner, and the side facing north reads 'I am in earnest - I will not equivocate I will not excuse - I will not retreat a single inch - and I will be heard'.

And the south-facing side reads 'My country is the world - my countrymen are all mankind'.

Between Exeter and Fairfield streets (the street names ascend in alphabetical order from south-east to south-west from Arlington to Hereford) is a more recent seated statue - that of Samuel Eliot Morision (1887-1976), a maritime historian born on Charles Street, Boston MA. It was sculpted by Penelope Jencks and erected here in 1982. Morison sits on a large granite rock. His writings were many, including Builders of the Bay Colony (1930) and The Foundation of Harvard College (1935).

Some of the stones contain inscriptions:

'TO MY

READERS

YOUNG AND OLD

"A FLOWNE SHEATE

A FAIRE WINDE

A BOUNE VOYAGE"'

'DREAM DREAMS

THEN WRITE THEM

AYE BUT LIVE THEM FIRST'.

The newest additions to the statues on the mall are of a very different order from the others, and are a result of the efforts of the Boston Women's Memorial, which commissioned artist Meredith Gang Bergmann to make memorials to three women - Lucy Stone, Abigail Adams, and Phillis Wheatley - whose progressive ideas influenced society by their writings. This amazing monument is between Fairfield and Gloucester streets, was finished in 2003, and shows a very different conception of representation.

Here, men don't stand (or rather sit) on pedestals, but women are at ground level and engage with the pedestals, and the public can touch the statues: it is a very original work of art.

'ABIGAIL ADAMS
                           1744-1818
'BORN IN WEYMOUTH, MASSACHUSETTS, SHE WAS
THE WIFE OF THE SECOND PRESIDENT OF THE
UNITED STATES AND THE MOTHER OF THE SIXTH.
HER LETTERS ESTABLISH HER AS A PERCEPTIVE
SOCIAL AND POLITICAL COMMENTATOR AND
A STRONG VOICE FOR WOMEN'S ADVANCEMENT.'
 

'..AND BY THE WAY IN THE
NEW CODE OF LAWS

WHICH I SUPPOSE
IT WILL BE NECESSARY
FOR YOU TO MAKE
I DESIRE YOU WOULD
REMEMBER THE LADIES
AND BE MORE GENEROUS
AND FAVORABLE TO THEM
THAN YOUR ANCESTORS.
DO NOT PUT SO MUCH UNLIMITED
POWER INTO THE HANDS
OF THE HUSBANDS.
REMEMBER ALL MEN WOULD
BE TYRANTS IF THEY COULD.
IF PARTICULAR CARE AND
ATTENTION IS NOT PAID TO THE
LADIES WE ARE DETERMINED
TO FOMENT A REBELLION.
AND WILL NOT HOLD OURSELVES
BOUND BY ANY LAWS IN WHICH
WE HAVE NO VOICE,
OR REPRESENTATION.'

         LETTER TO JOHN ADAMS

                       MARCH 31, 1776

'IF WE WERE TO COUNT OUR YEARS

BY THE REVOLUTIONS

WE HAVE WITNESSED

WE MIGHT NUMBER THEM

WITH THE ANTIDILUVIANS.

SO RAPID HAVE BEEN

THE CHANGES: THAT THE MIND,

SO FLEET IN ITS PROGRESS,

HAS BEEN OUTSTRIPPED BY THEM,

AND WE ARE LEFT LIKE STATUES

GAZING AT WHAT WE CAN NEITHER

FATHOM, OR COMPREHEND.'

LETTER TO MERCY OTIS WARREN

MARCH 9, 1807

'LUCY STONE

        1818-1893

'BORN IN BROOKFIELD, SHE WAS ONE OF THE

FIRST MASSACHUSSETTS WOMEN TO GRADUATE FROM

COLLEGE. SHE WAS AN ARDENT ABOLITIONIST,

A RENOWNED ORATOR AND THE FOUNDER OF

THE WOMEN'S JOURNAL, THE FOREMOST

WOMEN SUFFRAGE PUBLICATION OF ITS ERA.'

'FROM THE FIRST YEARS TO WHICH MY MEMORY STRETCHES
I HAVE BEEN A DISAPPOINTED WOMAN. IN EDUCATION, IN MARRIAGE,
IN RELIGION, IN EVERYTHING DISAPPOINTMENT IS THE LOT OF WOMEN.
IT SHALL BE THE BUSINESS OF MY LIFE TO DEEPEN THIS DISAPPOINTMENT
IN EVERY WOMAN'S HEART UNTIL SHE BOWS DOWN TO IT NO LONGER.'

SPEECH, NATIONAL WOMAN'S RIGHTS CONVENTION, CINCINNATI 1755

'I BELIEVE THE WORLD GROWS BETTER BECAUSE I BELIEVE
THAT IN THE ETERNAL ORDER THERE IS ALWAYS A MOVEMENT,
SWIFT OR SLOW, TOWARD WHAT IS RIGHT AND TRUE.'

LAST PUBLISHED STATEMENT, THE INDEPENDENT 1893.
 

'THE LEGAL RIGHT FOR WOMAN
TO RECORD HER OPINION
WHEREVER OPINIONS COUNT,
IS THE TOOL FOR WHOSE

OWNERSHIP WE ASK.'

      WOMAN'S JOURNAL, 1891.

'LET WOMAN'S SPHERE BE BOUNDED
ONLY BY HER'

SPEECH, WOMAN'S RIGHTS CONVENTION, WORCESTER 1851.'

'PHILLIS WHEATLEY

CA. 1753-1784

'BORN IN WEST AFRICA AND SOLD AS A SLAVE

FROM THE SHIP PHILLIS IN COLONIAL BOSTON.

SHE WAS A LITERARY PRODIGY WHOSE 1773 VOLUME

POEMS ON VARIOUS SUBJECTS RELIGIOUS

AND MORAL, WAS THE FIRST BOOK PUBLISHED BY

AN AFRICAN WRITER IN AMERICA.'

'IMAGINATION! WHO CAN SING THY FORCE?

OR WHO DESCRIBE THE SWIFTNESS OF THY COURSE?

SOARING THROUGH AIR TO FIND THE BRIGHT ABODE,

TH'EMPYREAL PALACE OF THE THUND'RING GOD

WE ON THY PINIONS CAN SURPASS THE WIND.

AND LEAVE THE ROLLING UNIVERSE BEHIND:

FROM STAR TO STAR THE MENTAL OPTICS ROVE,

MEASURE THE SKIES AND RANGE THE REALMS ABOVE.

THERE IN ONE VIEW WE GRASP THE MIGHTY WHOLE.

OR WITH NEW WORLDS AMAZE TH'UNBOUNDED SOUL.'

                                               ON IMAGINATION

'I, YOUNG IN LIFE, BY SEEMING CRUEL FATE

WAS SNATCH'D FROM AFRIC'S FANCY'D HAPPY SEAT

WHAT PANGS EXCRUCIATING MUST MOLEST

WHAT SORROWS LABOR IN MY PARENT'S BREAST?

STEEL'D WAS THAT SOUL AND BY NO MISERY MOV'D

THAT FROM A FATHER SEIZ'D HIS BABE BELOV'D:

SUCH, SUCH MY CASE. AND CAN I THEN BUT PRAY

OTHERS MAY NEVER FEEL NO TYRANNIC SWAY?'

'IN EVERY HUMAN BREAST GOD HAS IMPLANTED A PRINCIPLE

WHICH WE CALL LOVE OF FREEDOM

IT IS IMPATIENT OF OPPRESSION

AND PANTS FOR DELIVERANCE.

THE SAME PRINCIPLE LIVES IN US.'

LETTER TO THE REVEREND SAMSON OCCOM