Avery, Martha (1851–1929)

views updated

Avery, Martha (1851–1929)

American socialist and Catholic missionary. Born Martha Gallison Moore, April 6, 1851, in Steuben, Maine; died Aug 8, 1929, in Medford, Massachusetts; m. Millard Filmore Avery, Mar 18, 1880; children: Katharine (b. 1881).

Active and relatively prominent member of the socialist movement, founded the Karl Marx Class (1896), which became the Boston School of Political Economy (1901), of which her close associate David Goldstein served as secretary; with Goldstein, left the socialist movement (c. 1902) and published Socialism: The Nation of Fatherless Children (1903); baptized as a Roman Catholic (1904), pioneered the Catholic social-justice movement; served as president of the Common Cause Society (1922–1929); with Goldstein, launched the Catholic Truth Guild.