Helen Vickroy Austin

Helen Vickroy Austin (July 19, 1829 – August 1, 1921) was an American journalist, essayist, horticulturist, and suffragist.

Helen Vickroy Austin
"A woman of the century"
BornHelen Vickroy
July 19, 1829
Miamisburg, Ohio, U.S.
DiedAugust 1, 1921(1921-08-01) (aged 92)
Resting placeEarlham Cemetery, Richmond, Indiana, U.S.
Occupationjournalist, essayist, horticulturist, suffragist
LanguageEnglish
NationalityAmerican
Spouse
William W. Austin (m. 1850)

Early years

Helen Vickroy was born in Miamisburg, Ohio, in July 19, 1829.[1] She was a daughter of Edwin Augustus and Cornelia Harlan Vickroy. Her mother was a daughter of the Hon. George Harlen, of Warren County, Ohio. Her father was a son of Thomas Vickroy, of Pennsylvania, who was a soldier in the American Revolutionary War under George Washington, and an eminent surveyor and extensive landowner. When Austin was a child, the family removed to Pennsylvania and established a homestead in Ferndale, Pennsylvania.

Career

In 1850, she married William W. Austin, a native of Philadelphia, at that time residing at Richmond, Indiana, where they lived until, in 1885, when the family removed to Vineland, New Jersey. Austin did considerable writing. Some of her best work was for the agricultural and horticultural press, and her essays at the horticultural meetings and interest in such matters gave her a fame in horticultural circles. As a writer of sketches and essays and a reporter and correspondent, Austin had marked capacity. She was accurate and concise. Much of her work was of a fugitive nature for the local press, but was worthy of a more enduring place. One of the marked characteristics of her nature was benevolence. She gave much time and used her pen freely in aid of philanthropic work. She was for many years identified with the cause of woman suffrage, and the various institutions for the elevation and protection of woman had her earnest help.[2]

Long before the temperance crusade she was a pronounced advocate of temperance and while in her teens, was a "Daughter of Temperance." Her philanthropic spirit made her a friend to Afro-Americans and American Native Americans. She was a life member of the National Woman's Indian Rights Association. Austin was the mother of three children of which two sons died in childhood.[3]

Austin was a member of the American Pomological Society.[4] She died in 1921 and is buried in Earlham Cemetery, Richmond, Indiana.

References
  1. Herringshaw 1907, p. 59.
  2. Willard & Livermore 1893, p. 35.
  3. Willard & Livermore 1893, p. 36.
  4. American Pomological Society 1916, p. 237.

Attribution
  • This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: American Pomological Society (1916). Proceedings of the ... Session of the American Pomological Society (Public domain ed.). American Pomological Society.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
  • This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Herringshaw, Thomas William (1907). Herringshaw's Encyclopedia of American Biography of the Nineteenth Century: Accurate and Succinct Biographies of Famous Men and Women ... of the United States ... Illustrated with Portraits (Public domain ed.). American Publishers' Association.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
  • This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Willard, Frances Elizabeth; Livermore, Mary Ashton Rice (1893). A Woman of the Century: Fourteen Hundred-seventy Biographical Sketches Accompanied by Portraits of Leading American Women in All Walks of Life (Public domain ed.). Moulton. p. 35.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
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