Page:Sketches of representative women of New England.djvu/141

106 rish, was a merchant in Newburyport, Mass. He was bom in Thornton, N.H., in 1791, a son of Stephen and Betsy (Gerrish) Smith. The Gerrish family, to which his mother and his wife belonged, was founded by Captain William' Gerrish, who came to Newbury, Mass., with Percival Lowle (Lowell). Stephen Smith, father of Foster, was a soldier of the Revolu- tion. His name is on the Revolutionary Rolls of New Hampshire.

Baroness Posse's maternal grandparents were John and Catherine (Moore) Ballou (name legally changed from Bullough), the grand- mother belonging to the Moore family of Sud- bury, Mass., dating from early colonial times. John Ballou was son of Joseph and Abigail (Symmes) Bullough, of Newton, Mass. Joseph Bullough is spoken of in Vinton's "Symmes Memorial" as "a native of England and a man of large property." Abigail Symmes, whom he married in 1774 (Mnton), was daughter of Zechariah^ Synnnes, of Charlcstown. Her father was son of the Rev. Thomas' Symmes and great-grandson of the Rev. Zechariah' Symmes (a graduate of Emmanuel College, Cambridge University), who came to New England in 1634, and was for many years pastor of the church in Charlestown.

Rose M. Smith was educated in the Newburyport public schools and at the State Normal School in Salem. After her graduation she taught Latin and French in a fashionable private school in Philadelphia until her marriage. Possessing an excellent contralto voice, she gave much time to music, and studied under leading teachers in this country and abroad. While in Philadelphia she sang in one of the church choirs, and after removing to Boston sang in one of the churches until 1900. During the summer of 1885 she travelled in Europe for pleasure, and it was in England that she first met Baron Posse, who was on his way to Amer- ica. The friendship then begun was continued in this country, and in 1887 they were married and settled in Boston.

Baron Nils Posse, K.G.V., M.G., born in Stockholm in 1862, came of a noble Swedish family whose history dates l^ack fully one thousand years. His father was Baron Knut Henrik Posse, K.S., Governor of the Artillery and Engineering School of the Swedish army and Major of the First Field Artillery. His mother was Lady Sophia Lilliestrole, of an- cient Swedish nobility. In 1880 he was grad- uated from a Swedish college with a degree equiv- alent to Bachelor of Science in America, and fourteen months later was graduated with high honors from the Military Academy. Brevetted by the King as a Lieutenant in the Life Grena- diers in 1881, he was transferred to the Field Artillery with the same rank in 1883. While in the army he took his first yearly course at the Royal Gynmastic Central Institute, com- pleting his training at the expiration of his military service, and receiving his diploma in 1885. In 1884 he was assistant in the Medico- Gymnastic Department of the Institute, also an instructor in the Stockholm Gymnastic and Fencing Club; and from 1881 to 1885 he was an active member in the Stockholm Gymnastic Association, the leading organization of its kind in that country. Before he left Sweden he was an instructor in the army as well as in the public schools.

Coming to America in 1885, he settled per- manently in Boston, and for three years prac- tised medical gymnastics exclusively. The out- growth of a normal class in Swedish gymnastics, of which he was asked to take charge in 1886, is the Boston Normal School of Gymnastics, for whose estal^lishment he was largely indebted to the assistance of Mrs. Mary Hemenway, the well-known philanthropist. Of this school the Baron was director until January 1, 1890.

In February, 1890, he opened a gymnasium of his own in the Harcourt Building, on Irvington Street. This was the small beginning of the Posse Gynmasium, which at the time of the founder's death had over five hundred pupils, and, with its three departments, pedagogical, educational, and medico-gymnastic, its complete apparatus and appointments, adapted to Swedish and other forms of gymnastics, anthropometric e.xercises, fencing, dancing, and so forth, and its comprehensive curriculum, has come to be recognized as one of the finest in the country. His useful activities, however, were not confined to the gymnasium. He not only found time to make translations from famous Swedish authors on gymnastics