Eliza Brown Gano Rogers
(1800 - 1877)
Eliza Brown Gano Rogers was born on November 6, 1800 to Reverend Stephen Gano and Mary Brown Gano, in Providence, Rhode Island. Reverend Gano was pastor of the First Baptist Church, trustee of Brown University, and he served in the American Revolution as a surgeon in the Continental Army. Mary Brown Gano was the daughter of Joseph Brown and granddaughter of Hope and James Brown. At the age of twenty-one, Eliza married prominent manufacturer Joseph Rogers.
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In a society that marginalized women, Eliza Rogers and fifteen other Providence women met the need for an organization which addressed some of the issues faced by their contemporaries. The Home for Aged Women engaged with problems that affected unmarried, widowed, and homeless elderly women. Born of compassion and a desire to provide dignity to elderly women, the Home for Aged Women was created through the relentless drive of Rogers and her colleagues. Incorporated on March 9, 1856, the first home for Providence’s forgotten women opened its doors to residents less than two months later. Now called Tockwotton on the Waterfront, the institution moved to its third and largest location in 2013.
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As the Home’s principal founder and its president for its first fifteen years, Eliza Rogers brought to life her vision of a home that embodied respect for aging women. Eliza Brown Gano Rogers passed away in 1877. She was interred in the North Burial Ground, as were three of the Home’s other founders: Abby B. Watson, Maria M. Benedict, and Elizabeth Carlile.
Elisangela Fernandes, Student at Rhode Island College
Gallery
Older Tockwotton Home, before the new home (see picture below
New Tockwotton Home for Senior Living on the Waterfront
Older Tockwotton Home, before the new home (see picture below
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Eliza Brown Gano Rogers (1800-1877)
Eliza Brown Gano was born on Thursday November 6, 1800, at one o’clock in the morning, to Stephen Gano (1762-1828) and Mary Brown Gano (1760-1800), in Providence, Rhode Island. The Reverend Stephen Gano was pastor of First Baptist Church, an early trustee of Brown University, and he served in the Revolutionary War as a surgeon in the Continental Army. He married Mary Brown on July 18, 1799. Mary was the daughter of Elizabeth and Joseph Brown and granddaughter of James and Hope Brown. Mary Brown Gano succumbed to medical complications a little over a month after giving birth to Eliza, on December 8, 1800, so Eliza never knew her mother. In 1821, at the age of twenty-one, Eliza married Joseph Rogers (March 3, 1794 - May 14, 1873). Rogers was a prominent manufacturer in Rhode Island. According to census records, the union did not produce any offspring.
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By the 1850s Rhode Island’s growing and increasingly diverse population ignited a push for social change through reform movements that addressed several key social problems. One of the biggest issues facing many unmarried, widowed, and sometimes homeless elderly women was how to find a place to spend their last days comfortably. In March 1856, empowered by a spirit of compassion, optimism, and determination, sixteen local Providence women created a home offering refuge to the aged and impoverished. Through diligence and perseverance these women raised more than ample funds to open their first home and purchase the adjacent land. Established on March 19, 1856 the first Home for Aged Women was rented on May 1, 1856 and immediately began to house its first five residents.
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The Home for Aged Women was Rhode Island’s first such home for the elderly. Eliza Brown Gano Rogers served as first president of the home from 1856 to 1878; she was later succeeded by Maria M. Benedict, president from 1878 to1887. The Brown family connections helped to ensure that the home remained solvent, and Eliza’s husband Joseph was also a major benefactor of the home. Through the labor of many women, the home relocated to a larger location during the Civil War, opening in 1864. In 1977 the institution became the Tockwotton Home and it began admitting men in 1993. The name Tockwotton is believed to describe “the place where I live” and offer residents a real home in the sense envisioned by Eliza Rogers and the other founders.
The home has experienced tremendous growth in recent years. The Tockwotton Home moved to its current location on the Seekonk River in 2013 and is now called Tockwotton on the Waterfront. It continues to welcome Rhode Island’s senior citizens with the dignity and compassion envisioned by its founders. Today the Eliza B. Rogers Fund subsidizes those residents who are unable to afford the home on their own.
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Eliza Rogers embodied a spirit of giving and empathy that characterized many of the 19th century philanthropic endeavors led by Providence women. She died on December 23, 1877 and was buried at the North Burial Ground in the section for the Home for Aged Women. Three of the other founders—Abby B. Watson, Maria M. Benedict, and Elizabeth Carlile—are also buried at the cemetery.
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Elisangela Fernandes, Student at Rhode Island College
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Further Reading:
Clark, Marian L., Tockwotton Home, 1856-2006:150 Years of Care. Masters and Servants, Ltd., 2006.
Cott, Nancy F. The Bonds of Womanhood: “Woman’s Sphere” in New England, 1780-1835. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1977.
Gilkeson, John S. Middle Class Providence, 1820-1940. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1999.
Ryan, Mary P. Empire of the Mother: American Writing about Domesticity, 1830-1860. New York: Harrington Park Press, 1985.
Seventy–Seventh Annual Report of the Home for Aged Women. Providence, Rhode Island: 1933.
