Salem Women's
History and
Business Community
History and
Business Community
Susan Burley
Salem sites:
• 56 Federal Street (home,
no longer stands)
• Salem Athenaeum
Associated Salem women:
• Elizabeth Peabody
• Mary Peabody Mann
• Sophia Peabody Hawthorne
• 56 Federal Street (home,
no longer stands)
• Salem Athenaeum
Associated Salem women:
• Elizabeth Peabody
• Mary Peabody Mann
• Sophia Peabody Hawthorne
Educated, wealthy, influential — and helpful — Susan Burley is considered “the most literary-minded hostess in backward-looking Salem,” according to Megan Marshall, the recent biographer of the Peabody sisters, Elizabeth, Mary, and Sophia. To date, no one has undertaken a thorough study of Susan Burley, but her name appears in works on the Peabodys, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Jones Very, and other literary, Transcendentalist, and Unitarian figures in Salem who were primarily members of the North Church (today, the First Church in Salem, Unitarian). These talented people attended “Miss Burley’s” Saturday evening salons known affectionately as “Hurley-Burleys.”1
Susan Burley was born “Susannah” Burley in Boston in 1791 to William and Susannah Farley. Her maternal grandfather, General Michael Farley of Ipswich, had been a delegate to the Provincial Congress of 1774-5. Her father earned the rank of lieutenant during the Revolutionary War. After the war, he established himself as a “banker and broker and amassed a fortune” eventually moving his family to Beverly, Massachusetts, near Salem. Sadly, according to Margaret B. Moore in her book The Salem World of Nathaniel Hawthorne, Susan’s mother died when she was two years old. She was primarily raised by a father who valued philanthropy and education.2
While it is unclear where Susan was educated in Beverly, Margaret Moore speculates that she may have attended the coeducational school taught by college graduates including William Prescott. Susan Burley spoke German as well as her native English, and would have studied Latin and Greek — an unusual course of study for a girl. Moore quotes Marianne Silsbee, a contemporary of Susan’s, who described her as “‘a highly educated woman’ who valued both ‘acquisition of varied knowledge’ and ‘bestowing it with the devotion of a loving heart’ on those around her.”3
Influence
Susan’s father died in 1822, leaving her as well off as her sister, Elizabeth, who had married Frederick Howes. Before 1837, Susan had moved with the Howes to Chestnut Street in Salem. Soon after, they moved to a new home on Federal Street, which is where the “Hurley-Burleys” were held, according to Moore. Sophia Peabody, who often attended the salons with her future husband, Nathaniel Hawthorne, once wrote that she “could not do” without these Saturday evening discussions. Elizabeth Peabody found in Susan “an intellectual companion.”4 In 1838, Susan Burley expanded her literary influence by subsidizing the publication of a special edition of Hawthorne’s story The Gentle Boy: A Thrice Told Tale.
Susan also held versions of her salons for children to introduce them to ideas and intelligent conversation. Marianne Silsbee referred to these as “working parties.”5
Susan Burley moved to Boston in 1840 at the age of forty-nine. Mary Wilder Foote, a “regular” of the Saturday evening salons in Salem wrote, “Miss Burley’s removal [to Boston] is an unmingled source of regret and truly the dearth of all intellectual stimulous in our society is appalling.”6
However, Susan’s removal to Boston did not end her interest in Salem nor in her friends. She secured entrance for Nathaniel Hawthorne to the Boston Athenaeum, and attempted to intervene when his Salem Custom House position was in jeopardy. She also continued her intellectual pursuits, joining Margaret Fuller’s “Conversations” by 1842, which were held at Elizabeth Peabody’s bookstore and family home on West Street near Boston Common. These classes engaged women in high-level philosophical and political discussions, and they were attended by prominent female authors, educators, and reformers.
Margaret Fuller, who was herself an educator, author, editor, and Transcendentalist, once “exclaimed to Elizabeth Hoar that ‘Miss S. Burley has joined the class and hers is a presence so positive as to be of great value to me.’” After Susan’s death, [Ralph Waldo] Emerson “noted in the Memoirs of Margaret Fuller Ossoli that ‘the late Miss Susan Burley had many points of attraction for her, not only in her elegant studies, but also in the deep interest which that lady took in securing the highest culture for women. She was very well read, and avoiding abstractions, knew how to help herself with examples and facts.’” 7
According to Caroline King in her book When I Lived in Salem, Susan Burley returned to Salem in 1848 to organize the Salem Book Club. She even acquired books for its members to share, read, and discuss. The club lasted from 1848 to 1965, when it merged with the Salem Athenæum.8
Susan Burley died in Boston in 1850, at the age of fifty-nine.
Sources
1 The Peabody Sisters: Three Women Who Ignited American Romanticism by Megan Marshall (Houghton Mifflin Company, 2005, 362.
2 The Salem World of Nathaniel Hawthorne by Margaret B. Moore (University of Missouri Press, 1998), 224.
3 Ibid., 225.
4 Ibid.
5 Ibid., 226.
6 Ibid.
7 Ibid., 227.
8 Caroline King, When I Lived in Salem (Brattleboro, Vt., 1937), 167–8.
Susan Burley was born “Susannah” Burley in Boston in 1791 to William and Susannah Farley. Her maternal grandfather, General Michael Farley of Ipswich, had been a delegate to the Provincial Congress of 1774-5. Her father earned the rank of lieutenant during the Revolutionary War. After the war, he established himself as a “banker and broker and amassed a fortune” eventually moving his family to Beverly, Massachusetts, near Salem. Sadly, according to Margaret B. Moore in her book The Salem World of Nathaniel Hawthorne, Susan’s mother died when she was two years old. She was primarily raised by a father who valued philanthropy and education.2
While it is unclear where Susan was educated in Beverly, Margaret Moore speculates that she may have attended the coeducational school taught by college graduates including William Prescott. Susan Burley spoke German as well as her native English, and would have studied Latin and Greek — an unusual course of study for a girl. Moore quotes Marianne Silsbee, a contemporary of Susan’s, who described her as “‘a highly educated woman’ who valued both ‘acquisition of varied knowledge’ and ‘bestowing it with the devotion of a loving heart’ on those around her.”3
Influence
Susan’s father died in 1822, leaving her as well off as her sister, Elizabeth, who had married Frederick Howes. Before 1837, Susan had moved with the Howes to Chestnut Street in Salem. Soon after, they moved to a new home on Federal Street, which is where the “Hurley-Burleys” were held, according to Moore. Sophia Peabody, who often attended the salons with her future husband, Nathaniel Hawthorne, once wrote that she “could not do” without these Saturday evening discussions. Elizabeth Peabody found in Susan “an intellectual companion.”4 In 1838, Susan Burley expanded her literary influence by subsidizing the publication of a special edition of Hawthorne’s story The Gentle Boy: A Thrice Told Tale.
Susan also held versions of her salons for children to introduce them to ideas and intelligent conversation. Marianne Silsbee referred to these as “working parties.”5
Susan Burley moved to Boston in 1840 at the age of forty-nine. Mary Wilder Foote, a “regular” of the Saturday evening salons in Salem wrote, “Miss Burley’s removal [to Boston] is an unmingled source of regret and truly the dearth of all intellectual stimulous in our society is appalling.”6
However, Susan’s removal to Boston did not end her interest in Salem nor in her friends. She secured entrance for Nathaniel Hawthorne to the Boston Athenaeum, and attempted to intervene when his Salem Custom House position was in jeopardy. She also continued her intellectual pursuits, joining Margaret Fuller’s “Conversations” by 1842, which were held at Elizabeth Peabody’s bookstore and family home on West Street near Boston Common. These classes engaged women in high-level philosophical and political discussions, and they were attended by prominent female authors, educators, and reformers.
Margaret Fuller, who was herself an educator, author, editor, and Transcendentalist, once “exclaimed to Elizabeth Hoar that ‘Miss S. Burley has joined the class and hers is a presence so positive as to be of great value to me.’” After Susan’s death, [Ralph Waldo] Emerson “noted in the Memoirs of Margaret Fuller Ossoli that ‘the late Miss Susan Burley had many points of attraction for her, not only in her elegant studies, but also in the deep interest which that lady took in securing the highest culture for women. She was very well read, and avoiding abstractions, knew how to help herself with examples and facts.’” 7
According to Caroline King in her book When I Lived in Salem, Susan Burley returned to Salem in 1848 to organize the Salem Book Club. She even acquired books for its members to share, read, and discuss. The club lasted from 1848 to 1965, when it merged with the Salem Athenæum.8
Susan Burley died in Boston in 1850, at the age of fifty-nine.
Sources
1 The Peabody Sisters: Three Women Who Ignited American Romanticism by Megan Marshall (Houghton Mifflin Company, 2005, 362.
2 The Salem World of Nathaniel Hawthorne by Margaret B. Moore (University of Missouri Press, 1998), 224.
3 Ibid., 225.
4 Ibid.
5 Ibid., 226.
6 Ibid.
7 Ibid., 227.
8 Caroline King, When I Lived in Salem (Brattleboro, Vt., 1937), 167–8.
