Frances Whipple was born into the quintessential American aristocratic family. On her father’s side, the Whipple line included Rhode Island heroes like Abraham, who led the burning of the British ship Gaspee in 1772, and some of the earliest settlers of the colony. On Frances’ mother’s side, the Scotts included some of Roger Williams’ earliest and closest associates in the foundation of the Rhode Island colony. In 1815, though, nature leveled the Whipple clan. A storm called the Great Gale ravaged Providence, flooding wharves and destroying crops within a 40-mile radius of the city. It was also the year without a summer, thanks to the Tambora volcano in Indonesia, which erupted so violently that the ash clouds actually cooled the planet. With a future of nothing but drought, sooty clouds and gloom, her father sold the family farm in 1816 and Whipple was destitute. Frances supported herself through odd jobs and self-education. She became a very different sort of Whipple, and over her lifetime, she helped make America a very different sort of place.

Further Reading:

Sarah O’Dowd, A Rhode Island Original: Frances Harriet Whipple Green McDougall, 2004.

“Elleanor Eldridge: Folk Hero of African American Feminism”

“Let Usurpers Tremble: The Unrepublican Anomaly”

Whipple, Might and Right: By A Rhode Islander, Providence: A.H. Stilwell. 1844.

Music by Kai Engel

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