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There Theodosia put her talents for teaching to good use.

Theodosia, her elderly father and her younger sisters all moved to New Hartford. And when Ross and Isabella moved two years later to New Hartford, New York, Anna went with them … as did the entire Toll family. When Anna was 16, she lived with Ross and Isabella in Cooperstown, New York, where they were in charge of yet another congregation. They called Anna their “truly sister” and she quickly became a much-loved and integral member of the family. While Ross and Isabella led an almost itinerant life, moving from one church to another every two or three years, Anna enjoyed a very stable home life with Theodosia and her sisters. Though we can’t be certain when exactly Theodosia and Anna met, but we do know that very soon after Ross and Isabella’s marriage, Anna went to live with Theodosia at the Toll homestead in Verona, New York. An undated photo of Theodosia Toll Foster Theodosia had younger sisters, the youngest of whom was just about Anna’s age. Isabella’s good friend Theodosia Toll Foster was there, though, and that may have been the occasion when Theodosia and Anna met. None of the records about that happy and blessed day mention whether Ross’s ten-year-old daughter Anna was at the wedding. The evening of their wedding day they boarded a train and left for Ross’s first church pastorate. Ross and Isabella fell in love and married in 1866, the same year Ross graduated. An 1863 Union Army record showing Ross Alden’s registration for the draft. There he met Isabella Macdonald, who was visiting her sister Marcia and brother-in-law, Charles Livingston, who was also a theology student. While Anna remained with her grandparents, Ross moved 300 miles away to begin studies at Auburn Theological Seminary. Andrews Church, Richmond, Staten Island, New York. Ross was baptized, and a few months later his daughter Anna was baptized in the same church. Membership records from the Dutch Reformed Church of New York. He “united with the Reformed Church in Richmond, Long Island”-the same church, which, for generations, had been the church of Hannah’s family-and he began laying the foundation for becoming a minister. Three years after Hannah’s death, Ross made a decision that would influence the rest of his life. Here Hannah Bogart Alden was buried, and Ross and Anna were baptized. Census records show that by the time little Anna was four years old, she was living with her maternal grandparents, without Ross. We do know he stayed in New York, close to where Hannah’s family lived, and probably had much help from them. Very few records exist to tell us how Ross coped with the daunting responsibility of raising an infant daughter after the death of his wife. From the New York Daily Tribune, November 19, 1856. Tragically, Hannah died just two months later. Nine months later, little Anna Maria Alden was born. Ross and Hannah met in New York and married when they were both in their early twenties. Like Ross Alden’s family, Hannah’s ancestors were among the earliest emigrants to America her ancestors arrived as far back as 1652 and settled the New Netherlands (now New York) in the time of Peter Stuyvesant. When she married Gustavus “Ross” Alden in 1866, Ross had a ten-year-old daughter from his first marriage to Hannah Bogart. Like all Isabella’s novels, By Way of the Wilderness and the Chautauqua Books were allegorical stories, written to convey specific messages and lessons about living the Christian life.īut what many people don’t know is that Isabella was herself a step-mother. Ruth Erskine, the main character in Ruth Erskine’s Crosses, disliked her step-mother to the point of being ashamed of her and when Ruth later married a man with two daughters of his own (in Judge Burham’s Daughters), Ruth taught her step-children proper manners, but failed to address their spiritual needs. In By Way of the Wilderness, Wayne Pierson saw his new step-mother as an interloper and a rival for his father’s attention, causing much heart-ache for himself and his family.

In her novels, Isabella often wrote about the unique challenges of being a step-parent.

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