Brewster family papers

Civil War veteran Major Charles Harvey Brewster (1833-1893) was a prosperous Northampton businessman. He originally sold windows, doors, blinds and paints, and later transformed the enterprise into a successful florist shop. He married Anna Williams (1843-1935) in 1868 and the couple had six children: Anna Gertrude, Mary Kate, Caroline Williams, Charles Russell, Harold, and Helen Campbell.

Anna Gertrude (1869-1967) attended local schools and graduated from Smith College in 1893. She began her teaching career soon after, holding positions in Brewster, Massachusetts and Nashua, New Hampshire before studying for a year at Oxford University (1906-07). She taught English at Northampton High School from 1907 until her retirement in 1940, after which she taught at the Northampton School for Girls. Anna Gertrude was a charter member of the Betty Allen Chapter of the DAR, served on the advisory board of the Young Women's City Club, and was a long-time Trustee of the Forbes Library.

Mary Kate (1871-1957) was an avid traveler and a prolific writer. She went twice to Australia (1893 and 1896) and later to the American West (1920-21); she also traveled often to other parts of the United States. Her great love was the theatre, and she was especially committed to the Academy of Music in Northampton. She wrote several books and plays, some of which were published, as well as a treatise on the cultural value of municipal theatre. She corresponded with various actors and wrote reviews for "The New York Dramatic Mirror". She reviewed Smith College theatre productions for the Daily Hampshire Gazette, the Springfield Republican and the Boston Globe, and also regularly contributed articles about topics of interest in Northampton to these newspapers.

Only two of Charles Harvey and Anna Williams Brewster's six children married. Harold married Margaret B. Cable and they had three children: Gertrude, George and Margaret. Margaret graduated from Smith in 1932 and married Alfred C. Chard; they had two children, James and Carol. Margaret Brewster Chard died in 1982. Helen Campbell Brewster married Karl Brownson Allured in 1919. Their only child, Jonathan (b. 1920), married Nancy Babcock, and they had four children: David, Karla, Caroline and Charles.