Alice Mary Longfellow

Alice Mary Longfellow (September 22, 1850 – December 7, 1928) was a philanthropist, preservationist, and the eldest surviving daughter of the American poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. She is best known as "grave Alice" from her father's poem "The Children's Hour". Longfellow was born in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and attended classes at Radcliffe College during the 1880s and 1890s, studying at Newnham College in Cambridge, England, from 1883 to 1884. She traveled frequently throughout her life, spending the majority of her time abroad in France and Italy. Most notably, she met with Benito Mussolini in 1927. Alice Longfellow remained unmarried throughout her life. She died in Cambridge in 1928 in the same house where she was born. Longfellow worked to preserve her father's home in Cambridge, now Longfellow House–Washington's Headquarters National Historic Site. She served as the Massachusetts Vice-regent of the Mount Vernon Ladies' Association and held administrative positions at Radcliffe College throughout her life. She donated significantly to multiple causes dealing with historic preservation, education, and humanitarianism including the Audubon Society, the Tuskegee Institute, and the American Fund for French Wounded during World War I.