After 138 years in Queens, a pioneering woman journalist goes home to Wisconsin
Lisle Lester, a 19th-century writer who hired women typesetters, died alone in Manhattan. Women from her Wisconsin hometown won her ashes back for a burial Saturday.
A 19th-century journalist who gave women jobs as typesetters will be buried Saturday in her Wisconsin hometown of Fond Du Lac, 138 years after her cremated remains went unclaimed in Queens. Her ashes sat in a rusty bucket on a crematorium shelf in Middle Village, next to other forgotten remains, until a group of Fond Du Lac women fought to bring her home.
Who was Lisle Lester
She was born Sophia Walker and wrote as Lisle Lester. In the 1800s she left Wisconsin for a life of travel and adventure that few women of her time attempted. She founded The Badger State Monthly, the state’s first magazine. At the Milwaukee Sentinel, she then brought women into the typesetting room for the first time, recruiting them and organizing their work. Later, as editor of the Pacific Monthly in San Francisco, she again hired women to set type.
Her work as an orator, journalist and dramatist took her by stagecoach and boat to Hawaii, the Sandwich Islands, the West Indies and South America. She married twice, and newspapers around the country followed her ups and downs for years. Admirers called her a genius. Mark Twain called her “probably the worst writer in the world.”
Diphtheria took her hearing and ended her sold-out performances. By her 40s she had moved to New York City to look for treatment. Historians say money was tight even though she worked as a correspondent for a Washington paper, and she worked at a boarding house at 29th Street and Broadway to pay for a place to live. According to historians and her obituary, she died alone of pneumonia at 51.
From a Queens crematorium shelf to Fond Du Lac
The Fond Du Lac chapter of Soroptimist International took up her cause. The worldwide nonprofit works on education for women and girls. “It’s pretty amazing that they’re still sitting on a shelf,” member Laurel Munger, a retired public defender, said earlier this year.
The members researched Lester for years. Then they hired an attorney, who asked a court in Queens to release her remains. The ashes arrived in Wisconsin in June. Local interest in Lester goes back to 2001, when a biography of her was published.
The long-delayed memorial service, hosted by the Soroptimists, takes place Saturday. Afterward Lester will be laid to rest in a marble urn in the older section of the town’s Calvary Cemetery. Dawn Nelson, a funeral director and Soroptimist member, said carrying out Lester’s last wish to return to Fond Du Lac was a fitting tribute to a woman who fought for women and their rights.
Quick answers
Who was Lisle Lester?
Lisle Lester was the pen name of Sophia Walker, a 19th-century journalist, orator and dramatist. She founded Wisconsin's first magazine and hired women typesetters in Milwaukee and San Francisco.
Where were Lisle Lester's ashes kept?
They sat unclaimed for 138 years in a rusty bucket on a shelf at a Middle Village, Queens, crematorium, along with other forgotten ashes.
Where will Lisle Lester be buried?
She will be buried at Calvary Cemetery in Fond Du Lac, Wisconsin, after a memorial service on Saturday. Her ashes will be placed in a marble urn in the cemetery's older part.
