Biographical Sketches

Nathaniel Topliff Allen was born in Medfield, Mass. on 29 Sep. 1823, the son of Ellis Allen (1792-1875) and Lucy Jane Lane Allen (1793-1889) and the brother of William Cowper Allen (1815-1909), George Ellis Allen (1817-1888), Joseph Addison Allen (1819-1904), Lucy Maria Allen Davis (1821-1900), Fanny Lane Allen (1825-1831), Abigail Ellis Allen Davis (1828-1896), and James Theodore Allen (1831-1900). He attended public schools in Medfield and Waltham, the school of his uncle Joseph Allen in Northboro, and the Northfield Academy. Having chosen teaching as a profession, he graduated from Bridgewater State Normal School in 1846 and continued his studies at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, N.Y.

In addition to his studies, Nathaniel worked at the Waltham Cotton Mill during part of the year from the ages 10-13 and on farms in the summer. His early teaching positions included schools in Mansfield (1842-1843), Northboro (1843-1844 and 1847-1848), Northfield (1844-1846), and Shrewsbury (1846-1847). In 1848, Horace Mann appointed Nathaniel as principal of the Model Department of the State Normal School at West Newton, a position he held until the school relocated to Framingham in 1853. He served as principal of the West Newton English and Classical School (familiarly known as "the Allen School") from its opening in 1854 until his retirement in 1900.

The Allen School opened with 38 students, but quickly grew. Three of Allen's brothers, and later his three daughters, an uncle, nieces, and cousins, taught at the school and provided homes for the boarding students. The socially progressive school conducted co-educational classes, enrolled African American students, and was one of the first to include physical education as part of its curriculum. In addition to their academic studies, students attended classes in ethics, dancing, music, and art, and attended lectures by speakers such as Ralph Waldo Emerson, William Lloyd Garrison, and Theodore Parker. During its 50-year history, over 5,000 students attended the Allen School, representing almost every state in the United States, as well as Europe, Japan, Puerto Rico, Jamaica, Central and South America, Cuba, and Hawaii.

Nathaniel spent 1869 to 1871 in Europe as an agent for the U.S. Commissioner of Education, publishing a report on German secondary schools and educational systems. A progressive reformer, Nathaniel was active in the anti-slavery movement, the Underground Railroad, women's suffrage, temperance, and the education of women and African Americans. He served as an officer of the American Peace Society and the Society of Garrison Abolitionists; president of the West Newton Anti-Slavery Society; president of the Newton Woman Suffrage League; and a member of the Unitarian Club of Boston. He was also the first president of the board of directors of the Pomroy Home for Orphans in Newton, a position he held for 30 years.

Nathaniel married Caroline Swift Bassett (1830-1915) on 30 Mar. 1853, and the couple lived in West Newton with their four children, Fanny Bassett Allen (1857-1913), Sarah Caroline Allen Cooney (1861-1897), Nathaniel Topliff Allen (1864-1865), and Lucy Ellis Allen (1867-1943). He died in Aug. 1903 at the family's summer home in Linekin, Maine.

Caroline "Carrie" Swift Bassett Allen was born on Nantucket on 16 Oct. 1830, the daughter of James Nye Bassett (1801-1884) and Rebecca Fessenden Freeman Bassett (1805-1839). After graduating from Nantucket High School, Carrie attended the State Normal School at West Newton in 1849, studying under Cyrus Peirce. Here she met her future husband, Nathaniel T. Allen, who was principal of the Normal School's Model Department. After teaching in Nantucket from 1849 to 1852, she married Nathaniel on 30 Mar. 1853. She worked with her husband at the Allen School from 1854 until 1903, creating an enriching home life for hundreds of students who boarded in their home. After Nathaniel's death in 1903, she continued working with students at the Misses Allen School, founded by her daughters Fanny and Lucy. Carrie was active in the women's suffrage movement and an advocate for women's educational reform. She co-founded the West Newton Women's Educational Club, was a member of the New England Women's Club of Boston (with Caroline Severance and Julia Ward Howe), and the Browning Clubs of Boston and West Newton. A published essayist, she traveled twice to Europe, as well as to the western United States and Cuba. She died on 13 Apr. 1915 in West Newton at the age of 84.

Fanny Bassett Allen was born in West Newton on 21 Feb. 1857, the daughter of Nathaniel T. Allen and Caroline Swift Bassett Allen. After beginning her education at the Allen School in 1862, she accompanied her family at the age of 12 on their two-year stay in Europe, where she studied at the Conservatory of Music in Geneva and learned French and German. She later took art classes at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology with an interest in architecture, but was unable to continue her studies since women were not admitted to the program. Fanny taught French and German at the Allen School from 1878 to 1884 and from 1887 to 1889. In 1904, after her father's death, Fanny and her sister Lucy began their own school, the Misses Allen School for Girls, in their home in West Newton. Offering a college preparatory curriculum, the school had a maximum enrollment of 40 girls, including 10 boarding students.

Fanny founded the Lucy Jackson Chapter of the Daughters of the American Republic in Newton in 1896 and served as its regent for nine years. She traveled extensively, making three voyages to Europe, including a 1908 trip to visit her friend Pauline Odescalchi, Princess of Hungary. She died in West Newton on 14 Oct. 1913.

Sarah Caroline Allen Cooney was born in West Newton on 12 Apr. 1861, the daughter of Nathaniel T. Allen and Caroline Swift Bassett Allen. Beginning her education at the Allen School in 1864, she studied in Europe from 1869 to 1871. She initially prepared to attend Vassar, but decided to study kindergarten teaching with her former Allen School instructor Louise Pollock, graduating from the Froebel Normal Kindergarten Institute in Washington, D.C. in 1881. From 1881 to 1895, she taught at the Allen School, where she was in charge of the younger boys housed separately at the Annex. Sarah married attorney Patrick Henry Cooney (1845-1915), a former Allen School student, on 12 Sep. 1895, and the couple settled in Natick. She became active in the Leonard Morse Hospital, the Women's League, the Lucy Jackson Chapter of the D.A.R. (founded by her sister Fanny), and the Woman Suffrage Association. Discovering the lack of a Unitarian Society in Natick, she organized Unitarian ministers to give sermons at her home and later at the Universalist Church and the Red Men's Hall. After her death in childbirth on 4 Nov. 1897, the Sarah Allen Cooney Memorial Committee built a church in Natick in her honor, dedicated in Jan. 1903 by Edward Everett Hale and Samuel A. Eliot. Sarah was briefly survived by a daughter, Sarah Caroline Cooney, who died two days after her mother.

Lucy Ellis Allen was born in West Newton on 3 May 1867, the daughter of Nathaniel T. Allen and Caroline Swift Bassett Allen. She traveled to Europe with her family from 1869 to 1871, attending kindergarten classes in Germany. She began her studies at the Allen School in 1872 and received her A.B. from Smith College in 1889. Lucy taught at the Allen School from 1889 until her father's retirement in 1900. In 1904, she founded the Misses Allen School for Girls with her sister Fanny in the family's West Newton home, serving as its principal until about 1942, and also teaching classes in history, literature, and art. Lucy was the fifth regent of the Lucy Jackson Chapter of the D.A.R., vice-president and director of the Boston College Club, an officer of the Woman Suffrage Association and the Twentieth Century Club, and secretary of her Smith College class. Lucy traveled widely throughout the United States, made over 20 trips to Europe, and toured Japan, Alaska, Hawaii, and the Middle East. She lectured throughout Massachusetts on education, travel, and social welfare, and wrote numerous historical essays. Her companion Ruby Margaret Keefer (1887-1975) was a Radcliffe graduate who taught with Lucy at the Misses Allen School and shared her home from 1917 until Lucy's death in Nov. 1943.

Edwin and Gustaf Nielsen were the sons of Lars Nielsen (b. 1843) and Thora Engebredson Nielsen (1857-1897), Norwegians who emigrated to the Isles of Shoals near Portsmouth, N.H., and later Churchs Ferry, N.D. The couple had five children: Edwin Bjorne (1876-1958); a son (1879-1894); Olaf (ca. 1880-1903); a daughter (1885-1981); and Gustaf Arnold (1888-1960). By 1894, Lars had died, and Thora was living in the Episcopal Church Home in Boston with her daughter and Gustaf. Shortly thereafter, Thora moved back to Churchs Ferry and remarried, leaving her youngest two children at the home. Her daughter was adopted by Moritz Emil Richter (1825-1907) and Josephine Jenness Richter (1836-1914) of Portsmouth, who renamed her Ellnora. Since Edwin was a student at the Allen School, Thora begged the Allen family to take in Gustaf, her youngest son. Both boys became an integral part of the Allen family, described in Caroline Swift Bassett Allen's 1915 obituary as "two former wards, now as sons to the family."

Edwin Bjorne Nielsen was born on the Isles of Shoals on 24 Sep. 1876. He attended the Allen School from 1890 to 1895 and received a degree from Harvard Medical School in 1899. Traveling to Great Britain in 1900 and 1901 to learn medical procedures in British hospitals and clinics, he returned to open his medical practice in Boston. Edwin served as a private in Company D, First Corps of Cadets in the Massachusetts Volunteer Militia in 1905 and 1906 and as a major and surgeon with the 101st Engineer Battalion of the U.S. National Guard during World War I. On 7 July 1917, he married Lucia Amalia Schueg (1894-1993), a member of the Bacardi family of Cuba and a former Misses Allen School student. The couple had four children: Edwin Henry Nielsen (1918-2011); Henry Louis Nielsen; Joan Nielsen; and Janet Nielsen (d. 1922). Edwin died at his home in Brookline on 3 July 1958.

Gustaf Arnold Nielsen was born on 26 Dec. 1888 in Churchs Ferry, N.D. In 1894 and 1895, he lived with his mother in the Episcopal Church Home in Boston. After his mother returned to North Dakota, the poet Celia Thaxter, an acquaintance of his mother's, implored the Allen family to adopt Gustaf. Although he was never formally adopted, Gustaf became the Allens' ward and Nathaniel T. Allen's godson. After attending the Allen School, Gustaf studied at the Harvard School of Agriculture and Horticulture from 1904 to 1905; Massachusetts Agricultural College (then part of Boston University) from 1907 to 1911; and the Harvard Graduate School of Applied Science from 1911 to 1912, specializing in forestry and botany. During World War I, Gustaf served in the 2nd Company, 17th Provisional Training Regiment in Nov. 1917 and became a second lieutenant in the Aviation Section of the Signal Officers Reserve Corps in Mar. 1918. After the war, he traveled to Alaska and San Francisco on forestry assignments. He died on 24 Aug. 1960 in Vancouver, Washington.