Alice Ives Breed

She excelled as an organizer, using her executive abilities in religious, philanthropic, literary and social channels, aiming to improve the community.

[1] Her parents were Franklin Benedict Ives, one of the first pupils to be graduated from the Rush Medical College of Chicago, and Frances M. Luce, his wife.

She was descended from a Revolutionary soldier of Connecticut who, when word came to him that there was fighting at Lexington, shouldered his gun and followed Israel Putnam to Massachusetts.

In the 1830s, her paternal grandparents moved with their large family from Chautauqua County, New York, to a little settlement in Illinois known as Franklin Grove.

These families shared many sentiments in common, being strict Baptists, staunch abolitionists, and strong prohibitionists, and there was much intermarrying between them.

[2][a] In 1873, she married Francis William Breed, a prominent shoe manufacturer,[2] who was connected with business interests in Boston and Lynn.

She visited Canada, every country in Europe but Portugal, journeyed in Egypt, and left China in 1898 in order to attend meetings in Denver.