Emily Appleton

Emily Appleton was a Boston socialite and animal lover who provided financial support for the foundation of the Massachusetts Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals in 1868. Appleton was already nurturing an American anti-animal cruelty movement when she saw a letter in the Boston Daily Advertiser from George Thorndike Angell protesting animal cruelty. Within a month, with Appleton's backing, Angell incorporated the society. Appleton, like fellow female activist Caroline Earle White (who was active in Philadelphia), was excluded from executive participation in the society she helped found.