Nancy Carpenter Brown - The Woman Who Was Chesterton

Peter J. Floriani, Ph.D., must be thanked first and foremost: he was helpful in all ways on this and many other projects. From research to proofreading, to cheerleading and praying, Peter was involved from start to finish. Ora et labora.

I gratefully thank Dale Ahlquist, president of the American Chesterton Society. Over the years, Dale has sent me articles, pictures, papers, and copies of whatever materials I asked for and some I did not know I wanted. His unwavering support for this project has often times kept me going. Thank you for putting up with me, Mr. President.

Thanks as well to: John Peterson, Denis Conlon, Aidan Mackey, Julia Smith, Ann Farmer, Geir Hasnes, Martin Thompson, +Stratford Caldecott, Therese Warmus, Canon John Udris; the librarians at my own librarythe Antioch Public Library District; Laura Schmidt, Heidi Truty and the archivists at the Marion E. Wade Center at Wheaton College. Thanks to Carole Gale, part-time librarian at Brooklands College, Surrey, and Duncan Amos, genealogist and historian extraordinaire, of Oatlands Heritage Group, who got sucked into the Blogg family genealogy, all because Frances and Ethel once spent a half-holiday at a home in Oatlands. Thanks to Kevin OBrien for advice. Thanks to Hannah Korman, intern at the American Chesterton Society for finding the New Witness material. Thanks, Rose Korman, Dale Ahlquist, Peter Floriani, Sibyl Niemann and especially Eleanor Nicholson for editing. Thanks to Cameron Duder, Ben Klassen, Felicia de la Perra, Rudi Traichel, and Jacky Lai at the University of British Columbia. Thanks to Hilary Davies at the City of Westminster. Thanks to Rhonda Spencer, David Frasier, Zach Downey, and especially Nathaniel J. Pockras at the Lilly Library. Thanks to Elizabeth Broekmann at the Notting Hill & Ealing High School. Thanks to Veronica Colin at St. Stephens College. Thanks to Ann D. Gordon, Editor, Papers of E. C. Stanton & S. B. Anthony, for the George Blogg business card. Thanks to Ann Swabey, military researcher. Thanks to Justine Sundaram and the staff at the Burns Library at Boston College. Thanks to Danielle Robichaud at the Kelly Library at the University of St. Michaels College in Toronto. Thanks to Moira Fitzgerald, Kathryn James, and Diane Ducharme at the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library at Yale.

I owe a debt of eternal gratitude to the family of Frances Chesterton, her grand-nephews who shared their intimate family memories and photographs with me so generously.

Thanks to Jeremy Oldershaw, grandchild of Lucian and Ethel (Blogg) Oldershaw. Jeremy is the son of Basil Oldershaw, the middle son of Lucian and Ethel.

Thanks to Francis (Frank) Guinness. Francis is the younger son of Catherine Oldershaw Guinness; grandson of Ethel and Lucian Oldershaw, and was named after Frances Chesterton, as his mother planned on him being a girl. Thanks to his brother Geoffrey Guinness, too, the older son of Catherine (Kate) Guinness.

Thanks to Giles, Bob, and Walter Oldershaw, grandsons of Ethel and Lucian Oldershaw. They are the sons of Peter Oldershaw, eldest son of Ethel and Lucian.

Thanks to Nicholas Sheridan Barnett, great-grandnephew of Ada Eliza Keith Jones Chesterton, a.k.a., John Keith Prothero.

Thank you to some additional research assistants: Nancy Piccione, Su Morton, Christina Amari, and Marie-Therese Curtin.

Thanks to my Kickstarter team: Debbie Lillig, David Zach, Robin Brown, Tim Canny, Julia Fogassy, Bradley Harvey, Eric Townsend, Home School Connections, Leo Schwartz, Bob Cook, Skyler Neberman, Christopher Ouelette, John Gamble; and those Kickstarter angels who wished to remain anonymous, Emily, John, and Richard. And the Post-Kickstarter: Mary-Eileen Swart. Thanks for believing in this project.

I have no doubt that my trusting prayers to Gilbert, Frances, and Frank and Ann Petta, along with a whole host of the communion of saints also had something to do with the writing of this book.

Although many people helped me with this book, any errors are mine alone. I have tried to be accurate to the best of current knowledge of what is known about Frances Chesterton. I have no doubt more information will be revealed in the future, and will be added to this story.

N.B. Although during her life, Francess sister-in-law Ada Eliza Jones Chesterton preferred her nom de plume John Keith Prothero and insisted that her friends call her Keith, it is too confusing to use the name Keith when Gilberts middle name was also Keith. Therefore, for consistency and clarity, she is referred to as Ada in this book.

This vivid and splendidly researched study of Frances has long been needed, but it is also of major importance for the light it throws on her grateful husband in the warm domestic setting which significantly extended his life.

AIDAN MACKEY, Senior Fellow,
Chesterton Library, Oxford

A rich and meticulously researched account of the most significant influence in G.K.s life. Insights abound and important clues uncovered in this warm, compelling portrait of a great woman. Nancy Browns painstaking detective work is well-deserving of her Chestertonian name!

CANON JOHN UDRIS, Former pastor
of G.K. Chestertons home parish,
and investigator of his possible
Cause for Canonisation.

It is said that behind every great man there is a great woman. G.K. Chesterton alluded to this in his description of William Cobbetts wife as the powerful silence in her husbands life. Admirers of Chesterton have always known that his own wife was a potent presence in his life and it has been a cause of frustration that relatively little is known of her. It is, therefore, a great gift to the world of Chesterton scholarship that Nancy Carpentier Brown has broken the silence in this meticulously researched and wonderfully informative biography of Frances Chesterton, the other Chesterton without whom we would not have the Gilbert whom we know and love.