On this Mother’s Day, we honor those women who have made a difference in our

lives or those who we have looked to for encouragement. Sometimes, it is someone

special and often overlooked – like the “motherly” woman the Community Foundation honors today, Maude Grant Kent.

 

Maude Grant Kent had no children. Yet, she has influenced the course of many young people’s lives by assisting them to reach their dreams of furthering their education even years after her death. Her forward thinking still impacts our local young people today.

 

Based on her wishes, her estate was set aside to help “worthy and deserving young people to pursue a collegiate, university or graduate course of study, for young men and women who ardently desire further education and who do not possess sufficient resources to enable them to pursue the same.”

 

The Maude Grant Kent Scholarship was established for students in Jamestown and Southern Chautauqua County. The trust was transferred from Marine Midland Bank to the Chautauqua Region Community Foundation in 1984 in the amount of $160,000. It is currently valued at above $500,000. During the 23 years since the Community Foundation has been entrusted with the fund, approximately 350 students have benefited, with over $300,000 distributed to the young men and women of Southern Chautauqua County for their education. 

 

Maude Grant Kent was not your ordinary, quiet girl from Victorian Jamestown. 

Her thirst for education and her spirit of adventure made for an interesting life. Maude

Grant was born in 1874 in Jamestown, the daughter of Charles and Florence Allen Grant. 

Her maternal grandparents were prominent, local people, Dascum and Susan Allen.

Her grandfather, Dascum Allen, erected some of Jamestown’s early buildings,

including the Allen Square Building on Second Street between Main and Cherry Streets. 

Maude Grant was born in a building where The Post-Journal is presently located.

Education was important to her parents; and, as a young girl she attended Mary

Yates Johnston’s Primary School in Jamestown and was then sent on to Anna Brown’s

Boarding School in New York City. From there she continued her studies at Emerson

College in Boston. 

 

Until the age of 67, she taught school in the United States and Europe. In 1941, she returned to Jamestown to make her home. She died in 1951. 

 

If Maude Grant Kent were alive today, she would be pleased with the assistance

she has been able to give to worthy students. Her hope to assist local youth to pursue their educational endeavors continues. Her legacy lives on.

 

The Chautauqua Region Community Foundation Board of Directors and staff would like to extend to all our moms and those women who have influenced all our lives a “Happy Mother’s Day”.