Harriet Putnam Fowler
Portrait fromHerringshaw's Encyclopedia of American Biography of the Nineteenth Century (1906)
Born	(1842-07-25)July 25, 1842 Danversport,Massachusetts, U.S.
Died	July 28, 1901(1901-07-28) (aged 59) Danvers, Massachusetts, U.S.
Occupation	Author poet historian
Subject	Vegetarianism genealogy history
Relatives	Putnam family Geoffrey Chaucer

Harriet Putnam Fowler (July 25, 1842 – July 28, 1901) was an American author, poet, and historian. Her many publications were chiefly in the genealogical and historical line. She created nearly 20 large manuscript volumes of family histories, which she presented to theEssex Institute,Salem, Massachusetts. She also compiled several memorial volumes, wrote numerous poems, and published several small volumes.^[1]

Harriet Putnam Fowler was born July 25, 1842, in Danversport,Massachusetts.^[2] Her parents were Samuel and Harriet (Putnam) Page. She had two older siblings, Clara (b. 1836) and Samuel (b. 1838).[3] Fowler was a member of thePutnam family, who were descendents of John Putnam who settled inSalem, Massachusetts in 1634.^[4] Fowler also traced her descent through sixteen generations to Catherine Chaucer, sister ofGeoffrey Chaucer, the poet.^[2]

In 1879, she published a work entitledVegetarianism: The Radical Cure for Intemperance. Next, she published a novel entitledOur Smoking Husbands and What to Do With Them. Later, she collated a series of ancestral books of genealogy and heraldry. She was the author of a book of poems entitledPuritan Bluebells,^[2] and like her mother, contributed poems to papers. Fowler also published short stories.^[5] Her article "The Home of 'Old Put'" appeared inThe Rutland Daily Herald in 1886.^[6]

Although Fowler lived with a disability for 40 years as a result of an injury from an accident,^[a] her final illness was of less than a week's duration. She died at her home inDanvers, Massachusetts, July 28, 1901. Her memoir was incomplete at the time of her death.^[1]

Fowler donated the Putnam cupboard of English oak and cedar to the Essex Institute. Her ancestor, John Putnam, imported it probably about the middle of the 17th century, as the chest of drawers which forms its lower part was not developed earlier, nor were the geometrical patterns of the cedar mouldings used in combination with the splitbalusters upon thepilasters, until that date. Upon its back are marks of a fire from which the cupboard was rescued when, some two centuries ago, the Putnams' house was destroyed. Certain vasefinials which surmounted the posts, 'improvements' suggested by the taste of an 18th-century member of the family, were removed. The enclosed box settle with lifting lid in the Bulkeley Collection is almost unique among examples of colonial woodwork; when discovered in a stable atBarrington, Massachusetts,^{[dubious –discuss]} it had for many years been used to hold salt for cattle. It illustrates the earliest of the English modes of combining the chest and the table which produced the settle. The panelled framing of the seat indicates that cushions were intended. The usual type of earlier colonial settle more nearly resembled the high-back variety one finds in old village inns in this country. They were drawn in front of the fire upon a winter's night—especially when of curved shape, as in some old English inns until recent days—for the sake of light as well as warmth, in those days when the flicker of theBetty lamp, shown in the art work as an example, was the sole other illumination.^[4]

• Vegetarianism: The Radical Cure for Intemperance, 1879
• Our Smoking Husbands and What to Do With Them,c. 1879
• My Sleeping Father's Lovers, 1888
• Puritan Bluebells

• This article incorporates text from this source, which is in thepublic domain:Foley, Edwin (1911)."Plate XXXII The Putnam Cupboard of English Oak and Cedar, Present to the Essex Institute, Salem, by Miss Harriet Putnam Fowler".The Book of Decorative Furniture, Its Form, Colour, & History (Public domain ed.). G.P. Putnam's sons.
• This article incorporates text from this source, which is in thepublic domain:Herringshaw, Thomas William (1909).Herringshaw's National Library of American Biography: Contains Thirty-five Thousand Biographies of the Acknowledged Leaders of Life and Thought of the United States; Illustrated with Three Thousand Vignette Portraits ... (Public domain ed.). American publishers' association.
• This article incorporates text from this source, which is in thepublic domain:Perley, Sidney (1889).The Poets of Essex County, Massachusetts (Public domain ed.). S. Perley.
• This article incorporates text from this source, which is in thepublic domain:Stickney, Matthew Adams (1883).The Fowler Family: a Genealogical Memoir of the Descendants of Philip and Mary Fowler, of Ipswich, Mass: Ten Generations: 1590-1882 (Public domain ed.). Salem Press.

• Works by or about Harriet Putnam Fowler at theInternet Archive
• Putnam Family Cupboard, 1680Archived August 1, 2016, at theWayback Machine at thePeabody Essex Museum
• Fowler Family Papers, 1672-1913, undated at the Peabody Essex Museum

• 1842 births
• 1901 deaths
• 19th-century American historians
• 19th-century American novelists
• 19th-century American poets
• 19th-century American short story writers
• 19th-century American women writers
• American genealogists
• American historians
• American vegetarianism activists
• American women activists
• American women historians
• American writers with disabilities
• People from Danvers, Massachusetts
• Vegetarianism writers
• Writers from Massachusetts
• Putnam family

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