Lucy and Henry:  A Unitarian Love Story

In this Valentine’s season of love, let’s explore a little bit about the love story of Lucy Stone and Henry Blackwell, two Unitarians in the mid-1800s. Lucy was the first woman from Massachusetts to earn a college degree. She was a writer and lecturer on women’s rights and worked for the abolition of slavery. Henry was active in social justice reform, and advocated for women’s rights as well. Lucy vowed never to marry if it meant she must be ruled over by a husband. Lucy and Henry fell in love and it took more than two years before she finally said, “yes” to his proposal. In front of a small group of family and friends, Henry opened their wedding ceremony by reading a marriage protest he and Lucy had prepared. It redefined marriage on their own terms – agreeing to be husband and wife as equal partners, choosing not to live by the existing unjust laws that gave a husband ownership of his wife and all her property. Lucy Stone became the first married woman in America who kept her own name for the rest of her life.

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