Our own Thomas McMahon, Class of 1970, has done it again! Come see his video about Sayville’s own famous author Mary Louise Foster. Born in Sayville, N.Y. in 1876, she would become the most famous Sayville resident in the early 20th century, and you never heard of her?
Why?
Come walk with us through Tom’s story below, then please click on his video link to the right!
It’s a time, in our country when you think of history, it’s the stories of powerful, rich men. In Sayville, if you think of Foster Avenue, the Foster House, or the Delavan, you think of a Swedish Immigrate Andrew D. Forsslund known in our town as A.D. Foster.
A.D. Foster was a Swedish immigrate who begins his American story in 1849. He immediately headed to the Californian goldfields to make his fortune. You can imagine the stories he could tell.
In 1853 he set his roots in Sayville, married, opened one of many businesses, a retail store, and had a large family. Three sons and five daughters, one a daughter was Mary Louise.
Louise lived in a home with parents and siblings (Greycote), her dad was a voracious storyteller. He had adventures from Sweden to California, meeting and hanging out with Mark Twain. You can imagine the tales that were spun.
Louise used her dad as a source for many of her articles and books. Her writing also included her experiences in early, Sayville. Louise as a young girl helped in the family store, then as her dad’s business ventures expanded she helped in her father’s new hotel, the Delavan.
These work experiences were sources for her many characters in her future writings.
Louise as a young girl started school, in one of the early Sayville School houses. A two-story building located where the present firehouse is located.
She was recognized even then as a dreamer, a lover of arts, and acting, devoted to community service. It was in this atmosphere where she begins her early writing, one of her first stories, “Wooing of Ann Eliza Brown”, a disguised story of her mother.
She enjoyed writing and loved reading and sharing her stories at community and family events. A time before radio and TV, a time of telling stories.
In 1889 she graduated from Sayville Union School in the new building, Old 88. After high school she continued her education, (a rare occurrence for a woman) she attended the Packer Institute in Brooklyn, a girls’ school. This school was one of the few but growing institutions women went to advance their education.
Returning to Sayville, she began her journey to becoming an early American novelist.
She wrote many articles. With her sister, she’d take many trains to “the city”. She visited countless publishers to publish her stories. Over and over she was rejected by every publishing outlet.
It wasn’t till early 1900 that she finally got a publisher to publish one of her books; she was now 25. She didn’t know, but her life and career would be over in nine years.
With the success of “The Story of Sarah”, in 1901, a story of the Great South Bay and it’s baymen, she was now sought out by other publishers.
She began writing stories for newspapers and magazines all over the country.
Then, in 1902. she followed up with her second book, “The Ship of Dreams”; the story of two branches of an old Great South Bay family. It again was greeted with continued success.
Louise wrote many short stories throughout the early 20th century. Appearing in many newspapers and magazines throughout the nation.“The Home Coming”, “A legend of Lake Ronkonkoma”, “Amen Petticoats”, ”One More June”, and many more.
Her final book, her most successful, was Old Lady Number 31 published in 1909, the story of an old sea captain and his wife who wind up together in an old women’s retirement home, the fun begins.
In 1904 she met and married a fellow writer, Charles Carey Waddell. They had four children, the first three children died at birth.
There, fourth, a son was born and lead to moments of happiness, but also much concern for his health.
Louise would be dead within 3 months, May 1910, and her only son dies 7 years later.
An amazing life, with the possibility of being a great American novelist, was gone, and… then forgotten.
There were moments early after her death — when her novel the “Old Lady Number 31” was made into a successful Broadway play running for 160 performances in 1916 &1917.
This was followed by performances throughout the country for years. And then years later it was made into a silent movie, then a 1940’s movie “The Captain Is a Lady”, you’ll recognize Charles Coburn as the captain.
A woman forgotten, not for lack of talent, but more because of the lack of medical care for women that lived in her age.
One of the first Sayville School graduates, your brief life was a life well-lived. Thank you for your part in pushing forward the place of women in our country.
Asked before death of her dreams in life, she said, “Tell you the dreams of my life? How can I? They have been many, and I still dream on like a great big fool. But if this dream of becoming a writer-which possessed me from the time, I knew the meaning of the word ‘story’—if this is coming true, why should I not persist in dreaming still?” M.L. Forsslund -Foster.
