Author: MUZZY, Harriet
Biography:
MUZZY, Harriet (c 1789-1859: ancestry.com)
She was a native of Providence RI, a teacher, and a widow by 1821 when her one book of poems appeared. Born Harriet (or Harriot) Pennick, she had married Frederick Muzzy in the Dutch Reformed Church in New York on 1 May 1814. His exact date of death has not yet been found. The couple had at least two daughters, one of whom died young, but one--later Harriet Kile--who was able to give her mother a home in her old age. Muzzy gained a reputation as a magazine writer in the 1820s and continued to contribute to New York periodicals even after she secured a position as literary editor of a women's magazine in Philadelphia in 1827. The 1855 Census records her living with her daughter's family in New York. She died there, at 7 Stryers Row, Manhattan, on 2 Dec. 1859. (ancestry.com 17 Apr. 2020, 16 July 2026; Sandra Roff and Douglas Duchin, "Mrs. Muzzy--Who Was She?" American Periodicals 8 [1998]: 45-59; information from AA) HJ