Hetty Green

Henrietta Howland Hetty Green , nicknamed the Witch of Wall Street, was an American businesswoman and financier known as the richest woman in America during the Gilded Age. Known for both her wealth and her miserliness, she was the lone woman to amass a fortune when other major financiers were men.

She was born Henrietta Howland Robinson in 1834 in New Bedford, Massachusetts, the daughter of Edward Mott Robinson and Abby Robinson , the richest whaling family in the city. Her family were Quakers who owned a large whaling fleet and also profited from the China trade. She had a younger brother who died as an infant. At the age of two, Hetty was living with her grandfather, Gideon Howland. Because of his influence and that of her father, and possibly because her mother was constantly ill, she took to her fathers side and was reading financial papers to him by the age of six. When she was 13, Hetty became the family bookkeeper. At the age of 16, she enrolled at the Eliza Wing School where she remained until the age of 19.

Source: Wikipedia