Given that she was a woman in 18th-century Norway, her options of education were limited; women were not allowed to attend universities until 1882.

Leuch was at the centre of the merchant aristocracy of Christiania, and owner of the Bogstad manor, which he had inherited from his mother.

Collett continued living with their daughter until she sold the estate to her in 1772, the same year Cold married Peder Anker.

The marriage was largely based in their economy; Anker stated that it was "an episode where his soul had no part".

Orphans, preferably those of higher status families, would be given free housing, meals, and education until their sixteenth birthday.

The education consisted of literacy, calculus, geography, history, morals, and religion, and would mostly be taught by students.

Due to Mathia's adolescence as an orphan, she would often teach classes herself, and would treat the "foreign and poor children as her own".

A monument was established in her memory in 1803 by Anker in Paléhaven, a public garden close to an estate of his, Paléet, which would later become the residence of the royal family.