The Sarah Josepha Hale Memorial Park

Dedication: November 23, 2013 at 3:00 p.m.

Sarah Josepha Buell Hale

Newport’s newest landmark is located at the corner of North Main Street and Belknap Avenue on the Richards Free Library grounds. It will be dedicated on November 23, 2013 in celebration of the 150th anniversary of Thanksgiving. This permanent historic monument honors the legacy of Newport native Sarah Josepha Buell Hale (1788-1879) and has been designed to be both educational and contemplative. From this small New Hampshire town Sarah J. Hale grew to a position of influence felt across the nation. Through her editorship of the Boston Ladies Magazine and American Ladies Magazine and Godey’s Ladys Book (1828-1877) Mrs. Hale promoted the education of women and the importance of their role in society. The author of seventeen literary works and the editor of twenty-nine, she nurtured the careers of such notables as Frances Hodgson Burnett, Catherine Beecher, Edgar Allan Poe, Nathaniel Hawthorne, and Oliver Wendell Holmes. Her contributions to American culture include completion of the Bunker Hill Monument, spearheading the drive to save Mount Vernon, and establishing the Boston Seamans Aid Society which still exists over 180 years later. Her greatest achievement was a successful campaign to establish Thanksgiving as a national holiday.

Components of the Park

The Park consists of three paths leading to a central circle with multiple aspects featured in the central area to commemorate the many facets of Hale’s life and her contributions to literature, history and culture. A lamp to illuminate the Park at night casts a silhouette of Sarah Josepha Hale and an image of the characters in her well-known poem Mary and Her Lamb. 

– The central component is a bronze bust of Mrs. Hale atop a black granite pillar, symbolizing the black clothing worn during the fifty-seven years of her widowhood.

– An obelisk represents the Bunker Hill Monument which was erected to commemorate that significant battle of the American Revolution. The Bunker Hill Monument Association began the project in 1823 but it lagged until Hale became instrumental in its completion nineteen years later.

 – A column of books bearing the titles of all of Hale’s works represents her contribution to American literature.

The Artist: Finnish Sculptor Jari Mannisto

Sculptor Jari Mannisto is one of the most distinguished contemporary sculptors in Finland. He has had a large number of solo exhibitions as well as group exhibitions in Finland and Europe. In 2011 his sculpture Family Tree, a memorial to Newport’s Finnish immigrants, was installed in front of the Newport Senior Center on South Main Street.  His latest project has been a series of bronze sculptures at Virkkalanpuisto Park in Helsinki, a joint project with the well-known American sculptor Robert Wilson.