Martha J. Lamb

Martha Joanna Reade Nash Lamb (August 13, 1826 – January 2, 1893) author historian born in Plainfield, Massachusetts to Arvin Nash and Lucinda Vinton. Educated at the Willliston Seminary in Easthampton and the Northampton High School (Massachusetts). She published her first article "A Visit to My Mother's Birthplace." in a local newspaper Hampshire Gazette. On September 8, 1852 she married Charles A. Lamb. They moved to Chicago in 1857 and Martha became involved in charity work. With Jane C. Hoge she helped found the Home for the Friendless and the Half-Orphan Asylum. Her marriage ended by divorce around 1866, and she took her literary talents to New York City, where, in 1883 she purchased The Magazine of American History and became its editor.^[1]

Literary career

• Aunt Mattie's Library. a series of books for children including: Merry Christmas., Drifting Goodword., Fun and Profit. and Sabbath Schools. 1969-70.
• Spicy. 1873 (a romantic novel about the "Sanitary Fair" and the Chicago Fire.
• The History of the City of New York: Its Origin, Rise, and Progress. (2 vols.) 1877-81 (there was a third volume, too)
• The Homes of America. 1879
• Wall Street in History. 1883.

References

• Robinson, Raymond H. Madeleine B. "Lamb, Martha Joanna Reade Nash" Notable American Women. Vol. 2, 4th ed., The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 1975
• "Lamb, Martha Joanna Reade Nash." American Authors 1600–1900. H. W. Wilson Company, NY 1938