Mary Harrod Northend

Born: May 10, 1850, Salem, MA.

Died: December 17, 1926, Salem, MA.

Parents:

• Father: William Dummer Northend.
• Mother: Susan Stedman Harrod Northend.

Burial Location: Grove Ave., Lot 378, Grave 5.

Mary Harrod Northend was a writer who specialized in telling the stories of historic houses, their architecture and furnishings. As a young girl she was often ill and missed a great deal of school.

By the early 1900’s she had published articles or short historical sketches. At first, she took the photographs that accompanied the stories, but was not satisfied with these, and hired a professional photographer. She was in her fifties when her career began. She was very interested in the preservation of historic homes in Salem.

By 1910, she had over 14,000 photographs to her credit; in addition to using these to illustrate her articles and books she also ran a successful business selling the photographs to editors, architects, decorators and historians. By 1915, she had published articles in 37 periodicals, including the Boston Herald, Ladies Home Journal, Century Magazine and the Mentor as well as two books. She focused at first on colonial cookery, furniture and decorating, later adding landscape and architecture.

Her research for her works took her all over New England. She was known for spending hours arranging a room for a photo shoot. Her collection of interior and exterior photographs of homes had increased to over 30,000 images by the time of her death in December 1926.

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Photo: Find a Grave.

Sources consulted:

• Historic New England: Historical/Biographical Note: Sources Gamble, Jeanne M. Surroundings of Inspiration: The Progressive Era through the Lens of Mary H. Northend, 1904-1926, 2008; Guide to the Library and Archives, 11 and Boston Globe, December 17, 1926, p. A8.‍
• Mysticbooks.org
• Wikipedia.