|
10 Regent Terrace
|
|
|
|
This is a tribute to
REBECCA CLARENDON TALBOT
Inducted to the National Women's Hall of Fame 2009
http://www.greatwomen.org
Founder of the Rebecca Talbot Perkins Adoption Society
 |
Rebecca Clarendon Talbot was the eldest of the three daughters of Joseph Talbot who emigrated to the US in the middle of the 19th century from the small town of Street in Somerset. She was born in Brooklyn, New York in February 1866 and lived to the ripe old age of ninety, dying on 1st November 1956.
When Rebecca was just 24 years of age her father died in an influenza epidemic. He had recently established a Real Estate Brokerage and it fell to Rebecca to support the family by continuing her father's business. In the late 19th century - at a time when few women were in business and fewer still ran their own enterprises - Rebecca, as yet unmarried, was operating her own real estate brokerage in what was then the City of Brooklyn, she was one of the first two Brooklyn women to hold a brokerage license.
More than five decades later there still hung on her office wall a framed newspaper clipping dated March 9, 1890, that read: "Rebecca C. Talbot, a daughter of the late Joseph Talbot, was this week appointed a Commissioner of Deeds by County Clerk Kaiser. Miss Talbot is the first lady appointed by the present County Clerk and the second lady to receive the distinction in the history of Kings County."
Her aunt, Caroline Talbot, back in England, had already shown that the female family genes were strong, she was born in 1829 and had been in business before her marriage - being the first postmistress in Street.
Not long after Rebecca established herself in business, she became extremely active in charitable and civic work as a woman of many causes. In 1893 she joined the Brooklyn Women's Suffrage Society, a quarter century before women were successful in winning voting rights through the 19th Amendment to the United States Constitution. For many years she was chairman of the Alliance of Women's Clubs of Brooklyn, and she served as President of the People's Political League of Kings County. She was Vice-president of the Memorial Hospital for Women and Children and a Director of the Welcome Home for Girls.
After a couple of years operating the brokerage Rebecca was joined by Agar Ludlow Perkins who was introduced to the family and came from Iroquois, Dundas, Canada. He came from a family who had emigrated from Warwickshire, England in about 1630. Rebecca married Agar on 5th September 1895 in Brooklyn and they continued running the business together.
In 1921 Rebecca was approached to help find an adoptive family for an out-of-wedlock child. She put an advertisement in a local paper seeking adoptive parents. The many responses she received encouraged her to continue in this work.
In 1927 a committee of the Alliance of Women's Clubs of Brooklyn joined Rebecca to form a membership corporation and named it "The Rebecca Talbot Perkins Adoption Society" later to become Talbot Perkins Children's Services. The adoption agency was incorporated on 13th April, 1927. I have a copy of the Certificate of Incorporation for the State Board of Charities. This document has even more meaning to our family because it was prepared by her niece, Reba Talbot Swain, who was a young attorney and the first female Deputy Attorney General for New York State.
The adoption service came to be the main focus of Rebecca's community activities, and she served as its president from 1927 to 1949 and honorary president until her death in 1956. Her sister, Minnie, mother of Reba, was also on the board of the Adoption Society.
The Rebecca Talbot Perkins Adoption Society changed its policy over the years to incorporate fostering, day care, family support, etc.
Throughout her career, Mrs. Talbot Perkins possessed enormous energy, which in later years she attributed to her early work experience. "When I started in business," she recalled, "the hours for real estate offices were from eight o'clock in the morning until nine o'clock at night and no half-holiday on Saturday."
Though the work day and work week shrank dramatically over the decades, Mrs. Talbot Perkins managed to continue devoting long hours to her extensive philanthropic work. Over the decades she fought for such causes as better schools, improvements in the courts, increased pay for civil service workers and expanded social services for women and children, but her chief interest was in the Adoption Society.
In April, 2002, just as I had found out about the work of my ancestor, Talbot Perkins Children's Services closed down due to lack of government finance but I believe that the 80 years of support and help for the children of New York should not go unrecognised, as a result, I dedicate this page to Rebecca.
Sadly Rebecca had no children. Her niece, Reba Talbot Swain, died young and she too had no children.
I would like to thank the staff of Talbot Perkins Adoption Services, Mary Ellen Fitzpatrick of New York and my distant cousin, Marea O'Brien, from Australia for encouraging me to pursue the Talbot Perkins family. Without their help this page would not have been possible.