In the first half of the 19th century, Mary Marshall Dyer (1780-1867) was at the center of an aggressive anti-Shaker movement - an informal yet effective group joined by their despisal of Shakerism and their determination to thwart the new faith. With her husband and their five children, Dyer had been a Shaker for two years, but as her husband grew increasingly attracted to Shakerism, Dyer's own commitment waned, and when she announced she was leaving the sect and requested the return of her children, neither her husband nor the Shaker authorities would relinquish them. Distraught, angry, and...
In the first half of the 19th century, Mary Marshall Dyer (1780-1867) was at the center of an aggressive anti-Shaker movement - an informal yet effect...
The facts and fiction of an infamous New England murder
When the winter ice melted in April 1850, residents of Saco, Maine, made a gruesome discovery: the body of a young girl submerged in a stream. Thanks to evidence left at the scene, a local physician was arrested and tried for the death of Mary Bean, the name given to the unidentified young girl; the cause of death was failed abortion. Garnering extensive newspaper coverage, the trial revealed many secrets: a poorly trained doctor, connections to an unsolved murder in New Hampshire, and the true identity of...
The facts and fiction of an infamous New England murder
When the winter ice melted in April 1850, residents of Saco, Maine...
In the first half of the 19th century, Mary Marshall Dyer (1780-1867) was at the center of an aggressive anti-Shaker movement - an informal yet effective group joined by their despisal of Shakerism and their determination to thwart the new faith. With her husband and their five children, Dyer had been a Shaker for two years, but as her husband grew increasingly attracted to Shakerism, Dyer's own commitment waned, and when she announced she was leaving the sect and requested the return of her children, neither her husband nor the Shaker authorities would relinquish them. Distraught, angry, and...
In the first half of the 19th century, Mary Marshall Dyer (1780-1867) was at the center of an aggressive anti-Shaker movement - an informal yet effect...
