Mary Lincoln Beckwith (August 22, 1898 – July 10, 1975) was a prominent descendant of Abraham Lincoln. Beckwith was the great-granddaughter and one of the last two confirmed descendants of Abraham Lincoln, along with her younger brother Robert.[1]
Raised with her brother in Manchester, VT at the home of her grandfather, Robert Todd Lincoln, at a farm known as Hildene, the family estate in Vermont, she later grew up in Washington, D.C., and was said to have become "a squat, fair-haired, blue-eyed, chain smoker who golfed and dabbled in oil painting and sculpture."[4] Beckwith attended the Madeira School, then called Miss Madeira's School, a private prep school, but she did not go on to college afterwards.[5]
Prior to World War I, she was a representative on the committee on public information in Cuba.[6] In 1918, she returned to the family farm to fill positions left by men who had gone to war.[6] Beckwith took an agricultural course at Cornell,[7] and wanted to organize young women to work the farm.[6]
Beckwith was interested in aviation. Her first time flying was to ask for a ride in a plane at the Curtiss airport in Baltimore in 1930 and afterwards "she announced without any further formalities that she would like to learn to fly by herself."[5] She earned her private pilot's license by 1931.[5] In the 1930s, she built a private landing strip in Manchester VT, and purchased a number of airplanes.[8] One of them was a three-seat sports plane.[3] She also owned a Cutliss Gypsy Moth and a Traveler.[5] During this time she was living at Hildene with her grandmother, Mary Harlan Lincoln.[9]
By 1938, Beckwith was operating a 412-acre dairy farm at Hildene.[10] She had inherited this property following the death of her grandmother, Mary Harlan Lincoln in 1938.[11]
Later life
Beckwith never married or had children, and it was rumored she was a lesbian.[12] She ran Hildene "as a farm" and dabbled in art and sculpture.[13] Despite her desire to eschew publicity, she was well known by the local farm community.[14] She was known to conduct errands in the town around Hildene "dressed in blue jeans overalls, with a shirt and a man's cap."[15]
She died on July 10, 1975, at around 2:15 a.m. at Rutland Hospital in Rutland, Vermont, a month before her 77th birthday.[14] She had requested that her ashes be spread over her estate; this request was granted and there was no funeral or memorial service held.[14] Upon her death, her brother Robert Todd Lincoln Beckwith became the last living descendant of Abraham Lincoln.
