Though many now living in Hebron have never heard of her, Susan Bingham Pendleton was one of the most well-known women in our community in the first half of the 20th century.  But it would come as no surprise to those that remember Susie to learn that she was the topic of a library book club discussion just last year in Smithfield, Rhode Island.

The Public and Very Private Life of Susie Pendleton

Though many now living in Hebron have never heard of her, Susan Bingham Pendleton was one of the most well-known women in our community in the first half of the 20^th century. But it would come as no surprise to those that remember Susie to learn that she was the topic of a library book club discussion just last year in Smithfield, Rhode Island.

Born May 1, 1870 to Dr. Cyrus H. Pendleton and his wife, Mary Welles Pendleton, Susan was the middle child of the Pendleton’s five children (a sixth child, Winfield, died a day after birth.) Clarissa, Anne, Susie, Grace, and Cyrus E. were all born and raised in the classic Federal home on Church Street, right in the center of town, known to everyone at the time as “Pendletonia.”

In addition to being the town’s only doctor for almost 50 years, Dr. Pendleton was very active in the community, at various times in his life serving as Town Clerk, Selectman, Judge of Probate, District Health Officer, and member of the Committee of Education and the Hebron Literary Association. The library was of particular importance to Dr. Pendleton; he served as its first president from 1898 until 1919.

He was a scholarly man who wrote in Greek, read his Hebrew Testament upside down (“because it was more interesting that way”), and mixed his own medicinal potions right in his home. He was also known as being somewhat odd. Once, he decided that he wanted to measure the distance between towns in a scientific way. So he wrapped a rag around one of his wagon wheels (to keep them from slipping), and drove from Hebron to Marlborough, carefully counting the turns of the wheel, and then multiplying the number of turns by the wheel’s circumference!

All of the children were taught to value education, but Susan in particular demonstrated her father’s intellectual prowess at an early age. In the early 1880’s, and barely a teenager, Susie joined a group of other Hebron women to form what was known as the “Rosebud Society,” a group dedicated to books and learned discussions. Through a number of evolutions, the Hebron Literary Society was eventually born. According to John Sibun, “There was not a building to house the books, and they were loaned out from the front hall of Pendletonia; the “librarian” was whichever member of the Pendleton family who happened to answer the door.”

That initiation into the literary group probably influenced Susie as much as growing up in the Pendleton home. Like many other women of the time, she graduated from Willimantic Normal School, which today is Eastern Connecticut State University. For a short period of time, she taught school in both Hebron and Columbia. In 1908, she played a major role in the celebrations of Hebron’s 200^th anniversary of incorporation, assisting her long time friend, Ida Porter Douglas. As official Poetess of the event, she also wrote and delivered a poem simply titled Hebron.

Interestingly, it was Susan Pendleton who took the 1920 census for Hebron. She canvassed the residents, and carefully recorded their age, occupation, where they were born, and where their parents were born. For her own occupation, she listed “None,” even though she was 50 years old and a budding writer. True to her keen wit, for which she was well known, she also wrote the word “Lied” in her personal records when Roger Porter claimed to be 40 and Della Wilcox Porter claimed to be 43 (they were 42 and 45 respectively.) But in the end, she kept their secret and reported the younger ages.

Susie is best remembered as a poet, journalist, and historian. She is also remembered as somewhat of a “firecracker,” to quote one long-time resident. Her roles as historian and newspaper writer are closely intertwined. Susie was a correspondent for the Hartford Times, and for almost 40 years, she reported Hebron news for the Manchester Herald. In a significant number of those stories, she wrote about Hebron’s history, building on the research done by Hebron’s first unofficial historian, F. Clarence Bissell, as well as the documentary work she and her father had done.

But she never wrote for the Hartford Courant. The “firecracker” in her probably destroyed that possibility in October 1920, just a few weeks after the 19^th amendment granting women the right to vote was approved in Connecticut. Susie wrote a scathing Letter to the Editor which she demanded the Courant publish. “I am beginning to become quite interested in republicans,” the staunch Democrat wrote. “Picking up a recent paper of yours, I notice that you print a statement to the effect that when Senator-elect Lunergan visited Hebron only three (or was it four?) women were present to listen to him. Not a man. Why not lie about Wilson, the League of Nations, and so on? Why bother to lie about Hebron? I was there….” She then continues, insinuating the Courant favored the Republican party. For her efforts, she received a scathing response from the Courant editor. “The writer, who calls the Courant a liar and signs herself “very truly yours,” may be inconsistent, but she is welcome to her opinion…This Hebron voter will learn, in time,” he wrote.

One of Susie’s best known writings in the Herald was called “Hebron in History and Story.” Encompassing many pages, the lengthy article (published in a number of editions) presents a history of Hebron going back to the Native American roots of the land. It also contains references to events that might otherwise be lost, such as F. C. Bissell’s 1924 journey, leading a group of Hebron people, to locate Prophet’s Rock or that Miss Adelle White, whose ancestors had lived in the Burrows Hill area since the town’s beginnings, claimed that the original settlers actually called the landmark “Prospect Rock.”

Her writings always seemed to capture a bit of the new with the old, and as such become reference materials, especially in locating old buildings. When talking about Reverend John Bliss in 1715, she notes “his house was on Godfrey Hill, then known as Church Hill…” or “the first [Puritan] meetings in Hebron were first held at the house of Caleb Jones in 1709 (on the road leading east from where Loren Lord’s house now is.)” Today, these are important clues to researchers and genealogists trying to piece together old maps and determine where certain early 18^th century events occurred.

As a poet, Susie’s They Shall Remain continues to provide a look at Hebron as seen by someone who grew up during some of the most challenging events the community has ever witnessed, including the Great Fire of 1882, the Blizzard of 1888, and the Hurricane of 1938. The book, compiled by Austin Warren, was published in 1966 shortly before Susie’s 96^th birthday.

It is poems such as “Secret” in the 38-page volume that lend insight into the Susan Bingham Pendleton most people didn’t know. In that poem she wrote:

I will lock it tight away
Under a clamped lid.
(But will not people turn and say
“She keeps something hid”?)
My heart shall be its hiding place…

In Part II: Susie’s poems reveal a woman who kept her emotions in check, as was the expectation of that day. But through the oral history she passed on to her great nephew, Horace Sellers, who lived with Susie off and on for 50 years, we learn much more about the private life and shattered dreams of this very public woman.

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