Harriet Elizabeth Beecher Stowe (1812-1896) was born in Litchfield, Connecticut; the daughter of Dr. Lyman Beecher, a distinguished clergyman. The family moved in 1833 to Cincinnati. In 1836 Harriet married Rev. Calvin Stowe, who later became a professor at Bowdoin College in Maine. The couple was living in Maine in 1851 when she began publishing “Uncle Tom’s Cabin” in weekly installments. This depiction of life for African Americans under slavery was then published as a book in 1852. It was enormously popular, selling an unprecedented 300,000 copies in the U.S. in its first year. It was also widely dramatized on stage. The story energized anti-slavery forces in the North and had a powerful impact on the growing rift between north and south in the 1850s.

During her years in Cincinnati she wrote stories for the Cincinnati “Gazette” and other periodicals. A number of these were collected and published in a volume entitled “The Mayflower“.