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(Born: September 29, 1831 -
Died: February 23, 1909)
Miss Rice was a Baltimore school
teacher (Western Female High
School)
and elocutionist. Under the authority of the Public School Teacher's
Association,
she organized and led the effort to provide for a memorial to mark
Poe's
burial place in the Westminster Burying grounds. To raise funds, she
and
other teachers encouraged students to contribute "pennies for Poe" and
held a variety of special events. Early in the 1870s, she also arranged
an evening of music and elocution to benefit Poe's aging and destitute
sister, Rosalie.
Following the dedication of the
monument on November 25, 1875,
Miss
Rice published Edgar Allan Poe: A Memorial Volume, Baltimore:
Turnbull
Brothers, 1877. This book includes substantial extracts from the
presentations
and testimonial letters from Tennyson, Longfellow, Stephen Mallarme and
others. The originals of these letters were donated to the Enoch Pratt
Free Library in Baltimore.
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