Jeanes, Anna Thomas (1822–1907)

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Jeanes, Anna Thomas (1822–1907)

American Quaker philanthropist. Born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, on April 7, 1822; died at Stapeley Hall, a Friends home in Germantown, Pennsylvania, on September 24, 1907; youngest of ten children of Isaiah Jeanes (a shipping merchant and Quaker) and Anna (Thomas) Jeanes (died 1826); never married; no children.

Anna Thomas Jeanes led a quiet life, with a predilection for the philosophy of Buddhism. When the last of her brothers and sisters died in 1894, she inherited over $2 million and spent the remaining years of her life dispersing the funds. Her benefactions included $200,000 to the Spring Garden Institute, a technical school, $100,000 to the Hicksite Friends, and $200,000 to the Pennsylvania Home for Aged Friends, a Quaker institution where she spent the closing years of her own life. In 1907, she left the sum of $1 million to be used exclusively for the benefit of African-American elementary schools in the South and to develop improved means of education for blacks. "Jeanes teachers" traveled from school to school to advise local teachers.

collections:

Letters in the Friends Historical Library, Swarthmore, Pennsylvania.

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Jeanes, Anna Thomas (1822–1907)

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