Kate Douglas Smith Wiggin,
A Village Stradivarius
“ These charms would never have been noted by any seeing man in Edgewood, but they were revealed to Anthony Croft while Lyddy, like the good Samaritan, bound up his wounds. It is these saving stars that light the eternal darkness of the blind. ”
Virginia Tatnall Peacock, Famous American Belles of the Nineteenth Century
“ Edgewood gave her a sorry welcome. Everywhere, within and without, it showed signs of long neglect. Yet such as it was, it was home and full of memories of her father, whose portrait still hung in its broad hallway, and whose marble bust still adorned its library. There, too, were his beloved books that he had craved in his youth when he had turned from nature, which became, however, the tender solace of his ailing years, when he liked to be alone with her and his own thoughts, while he took long tramps over the hills. ”
Authors at home: Personal and biographical sketches of well-known American writers (1902)
“ Edgewood has been identified with its present owner for a generation. He was not always a farmer; but farming was his early passion, and after several years of writing and wandering, he settled down here in 1855 and returned to his first love. On leaving college he went to work on his grandfather’s farm near Norwich. He gained at this time the prize of a silver cup from the New York Agricultural Society, for plans of farm buildings. He became a correspondent of The Albany Cultivator (now The Country Gentleman) , contributing letters from Europe during his first visit abroad, in 1844-6. ”
