Alice Mabel Bacon
Alice Mabel Bacon (February 26, 1858 – May 1, 1918) was an American writer, women's educator and a foreign advisor to the Japanese government in Meiji period Japan. Early life Alice Mabel Bacon was the youngest of the three daughters and two sons of Reverend Leonard Bacon, pastor of the Center Church in New Haven, Connecticut, professor at the Yale Divinity School, and his second wife, Catherine Elizabeth Terry. In 1872, when Alice was fourteen, Japanese envoy Mori Arinori selected her father's home as a residence for Japanese women being sent overseas for education by the Meiji government, as part of the Iwakura Mission. Alice received twelve-year-old Yamakawa Sutematsu as her house-guest. The two girls were of similar age, and soon formed a close bond. For ten years the two girls were like sisters and enhanced each other's interests in their different cultures. Education and career Bacon graduated from high school but was forced to give up hopes of attending university due to economic circumstances. Nevertheless, she was able to pass examinations for a Bachelor of Arts from Harvard University in 1881 and held a post as a teacher at the Hampton Institute in 1883. In 1888, Bacon received an