Harriet Beecher Stowe
Harriet Beecher Stowe (June 14, 1811 - July 1, 1896) was an abolitionist, and writer of more than 10 books, the most famous being Uncle Tom's Cabin which describes life in slavery, and which was first published in serial form from 1851 to 1852 in an abolitionist organ, the National Era, edited by Gamaliel Bailey. Her second book was .
She was the daughter of Lyman Beecher, an abolitionist preacher from Boston, and the sister of renowned minister, Henry Ward Beecher. In 1832, her family moved to Cincinnati, a hotbed of the abolitionist movement, where her father became the first president of Lane Theological Seminary. There she gained first-hand knowledge of slavery and the Underground railroad and was moved to write Uncle Tom's Cabin, the first major American novel with an African-American hero.