I am delighted to report to the Andover Beacon readership that I have completed my research and essays on Mary N. Chase and her father, Uriah Chase.  I thank again the many persons who contributed to my projects. 

The father and daughter belong to Andover’s history.

Uriah (1820-1888), a Free Will Baptist minister, commands attention for his powerful evangelical preaching, his inquiring mind, and his authorship of more than 100,000 lines of poetry.  He established his place in our history when he was the pastor at the FWB Church in East Andover, April 1861-1863. Harriet Ann, his wife and mother of his first son, died November 18, 1862.  In February 1863 he married Lizzie Guilford.  On December 28, 1863, in Wolfeboro, she gave birth to Mary N. Chase. 

A historical marker outside the Stone Chapel on the Proctor campus notes Mary Chase’s arrival in Andover in 1899 and commemorates her leadership in the NH suffrage movement.  After championing the right of women to vote, Chase remained in Andover, devoting herself to the cause of world peace. She had an active part in the community and after she retired in July 1948, to a home for elderly women in a Boston suburb, she kept in touch, despite failing eyesight, with her many friends.

The Andover Public Library, the William A. Bachelder Library, the Andover Historical Society, and Proctor’s Lovejoy Library have copies of both essays.  I consider them to be “works in progress” and welcome information that adds to the stories and corrects errors in fact or style.