Mary Bonney

Early life & education

Mary Bonney was the fourth child out of six children who were devoted Baptist. She started her education at Ladies Academy in Hamilton, New York, she transferred to Emma Willard School. Here is where she found a curriculum almost identical provided in men's colleges. After two years in Emma Willard School, she graduated in 1835 and her teaching career began. She taught in many of places including, New Jersey, Jersey City, New York City, South Carolina, Providence, Rhode Island, Philadelphia, among others.

After she graduated Emma Willard School, she moved to New Jersey to take a teaching job. After that teaching job, she moved to New York City where she became the principal of academy in De Ruyter, before she took a temporary teaching spot at her alma mater. The following move was in 1842 when she decided to move South in order to be in charge of a girls' school in Beaufort. However, after being in South Carolina for six years she moved back North to teach in Providence, Rhode Island. That stay did not last long, she moved a year later to Philadelphia to take another teaching position.

In 1850, Bonney wanted to provide her widowed mother a house, in that path she decided to co-found the Chestnut Street Female Seminary in Philadelphia, with Harriette A. Dillaye, a former student and teacher at Troy Female Seminary. However the school later moved to the Ogontz Estate, home of Jay Cooke, in Cheltenham Township, Pennsylvania, and the name of the school changed to Ogontz School for Young Ladies. The school offered young teens ages 13 through 18 boarders and day students a liberal art education, which included science, humanities, and physical education. As the school became more successful, more space was needed. Since there was a rapid growth, the school's final principal, Abby Sutherland purchased a 40- acre estate in Rydal, PA, about eight miles from Philadelphia, at the current site of Penn State Abington College.

Activist

In 1878 congress proposed to take land from the treaties reserving lands in Indian Territory of particular tribes. Bonney being upset she decided to do something, she started a petition. She decided to ask for help from her missionary circle. With their help she started a campaign that collected about 13,000 signatures. The petition was gathered and presented, to President Rutherford B. Hayes and then to Congress. After there was another petition, however this one had 50,000 signatures and was presented in 1881 to Senate through Senator Henry L. Dawes. That same year she and the other people following her decided to officially become an association. They called themselves Indian Treaty-Keeping and Protective Association, which Bonney became president by being chosen. The third petition was presented in 1882 with double the signatures, from the previous petition. This petition however, outlined a proposal to grant tribal lands to Native Americans.

Marriage & death

As Bonney's preseidency ended in November 1884 her role in everything became less. However she never left the causes without any financial support. The reason which she stopped to engage in all organizations was her marriage in 1888. She married Revernd Thomas Rambaut, which she had met forty years ago in Robertville, in South Carolina. In 1888 both took part in the World’s Missionary convention in London. They became husband and wife at this convention. After the couple settled down in Bonney's hometown, Himiliton, New York. However, not too long after Reverend Rambaut died on October 15, 1890. After this tragedy Mary Bonney decided to move in with her brother, where ten years later Bonney died. Members of the Women’s National Indian Association grieve for her loss, remembering their deep appreciation of her life of noble service.