Seddie Powers was a young single Victorian lady and taught at the Onominese School. She took over for Ann Morgan in the summer of 1868. The school was in Onomonee Village (west of Northport on Lake Michigan), and she instructed the native children in the village.
Seddie did not last very long, only a few months. She wrote a melancholy poem about the sound of the waves and the isolation she felt there (under her pen name of Faustine). She left on Oct 2nd of that year and Mr. Ranger took over on Oct 13th.
“I watch the dawn and dying of the days, as, one by one, they flit away and are numbered with the things of the past.”
She used the penname Faustine because women were not given much credit as writers in the 1800’s. Seddie’s forlorn solitude on this inland coast has similarities, and she expresses our angst beautifully.
Courtesy Kevin Karl Brooks and Northern Michigan Photos and Postcards’