Sarah Wyman Whitman

“I go to town today. I was in three cities yesterday: but tomorrow I hope for leisure —– to work in!” –Sarah Wyman Whitman (letter to Sarah Orne Jewett, Tuesday, Summer. c. 1883) MS Am  MS Am 1743.1 (107), Houghton Library, Harvard University. Transcription and notes by Terry Heller, Coe College.

Energetic, compassionate, gifted, and jubilant, Sarah Wyman Whitman was a bright light of the Boston arts set. Moving between her Boston Beacon Hill home and studio, with a vacation home on the North Shore, Whitman was like Jewett, dedicated to her art and to her friends, and like Annie Fields, devoted to social reform, particularly women’s and children’s education.

This posthumous portrait (1909-10) of Whitman is by fellow artist, and member of Jewett’s Boston circle of friends, Helen Bigelow Merriman.