1829 - 1921 Author of "Ring the bells, the golden hours" Hanaford, Phoebe A., née Coffin, daughter of George F. Coffin, was born at Nantucket Island, May 6, 1829. Mrs. Hanaford is an Universalist, and one of their recognized ministers. Her hymn "Cast thy bread upon the waters" (Work and Wait), is in the Laudes Domini, N.Y., 1884, and other American collections.
--John Julian, Dictionary of Hymnology, Appendix, Part II (1907)
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Born: May 6, 1829, Nantucket Island, Massachusetts.
Died: June 2, 1921, Rochester, New York.
Daughter of Quaker ship owner George F. Coffin, Phoebe was cousin to feminist Lucretia Mott. A gifted writer, she was published in the local paper by the time she was a teenager. She studied Latin and mathematics and taught school for a few years, then in 1849 married Dr. Joseph H. Hanaford. The couple lived in Newton and Reading, Massachusetts, and had two children. Phoebe continued her literary efforts, producing poetry, children’s stories, essays, and biographies (her biography of Abraham Lincoln sold 20,000 copies). She also edited a Universalist magazine, and, urged by Rev. Olympia Brown, she eventually became a Universalist minister (the first woman ordained in New England). She served churches in Hingham and Waltham, Massachusetts; New Haven, Connecticut, and Jersey City, New Jersey. Her works include:
Life of George Peabody
Women of the Century (Boston, Massachusetts: B. B. Russell, 1877)
www.hymntime.com/tch
Phoebe A. Hanaford