Who knew that the poet who wrote "Over the River and Through the Wood” was also an intersectional feminist? Child caused a sensation with her first novel, written from a woman's viewpoint and featuring an interracial storyline between a European American settler woman and a Native American man.

An ardent abolitionist, journalist and editor, Child never shied away from telling uncomfortable truths about the nation's history. She wrote the first major historical review of enslavement in the United States and published a book on atrocities committed against New England's indigenous peoples. She also served as editor for two important Black works: Harriet Jacobs' memoir, “Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl," and the essential anthology, “The Freedmen's Book," which helped edu cate thousands of formerly enslaved people. A leading advocate for true universal suffrage, Child was a threat to the existing social order and a model for those of us in the modern era