ABSTRACT
Marietta Holley was born July 16, 1836 to John Milton and Mary Taber Holley. She was the last of seven children born into a farm family in southern Jefferson County, New York, near the villages of Adams and Pierrepont Manor. When her three surviving older brothers left the small farm to make their fortunes in the West after their father's death in the 1860s, Holley was left to help support the family by selling handicrafts and giving music lessons to young women of more prosperous families. Her formal education in the rural district school ended at age fourteen because there was no more money to support it, although an uncle paid for her own music lessons because she seemed gifted. By 1872 she was bold enough to send a few sketches to Elisha Bliss at American Publishing, Mark Twain's publisher.
