Preservation
Anne Longfellow Pierce (1810–1901) was the last family member to live in the house. She deliberately kept the house much as it was in Peleg Wadsworth's time, but is perhaps best remembered for growing oranges in the window (no small feat in a Maine winter). Her will stipulated that the house, lot, and many furnishings be given to the Maine Historical Society upon her death.
Pierce died in 1901 and the Maine Historical Society opened the home to the public within a year. At the time, only one other American author's home was owned by an organization committed to its preservation, specifically the John Greenleaf Whittier Homestead in Haverhill, Massachusetts.
Read more about this topic: Wadsworth-Longfellow House
Famous quotes containing the word preservation:
“If there is ANY THING which it is the duty of the WHOLE PEOPLE to never entrust to any hands but their own, that thing is the preservation and perpetuity, of their own liberties, and institutions.”
—Abraham Lincoln (1809–1865)
“The preservation of life seems to be rather a slogan than a genuine goal of the anti-abortion forces; what they want is control. Control over behavior: power over women. Women in the anti-choice movement want to share in male power over women, and do so by denying their own womanhood, their own rights and responsibilities.”
—Ursula K. Le Guin (b. 1929)
“The preservation of health is a duty. Few seem conscious that there is such a thing as physical morality.”
—Herbert Spencer (1820–1903)