the reverse says: Photo of Mrs Elizabeth F (Curry) Moloney, Supervisor of Mother’s Aid, State House, Boston, Mass. Taken on 37th birthday July 29, 1910

Elizabeth Curry Moloney was born in Charlestown in 1873. She taught for several years in the Boston Public Schools. Along with several other women, Elizabeth assisted in establishing a well-baby clinic and in setting up a mothers’ club in Charlestown where immigrant mothers could learn English, take out their first papers towards citizenship and have free lessons in cooking, dressmaking, etc.

Elizabeth enrolled in classes at Simmons College School of Social Work. In 1914, she took a state civil service examination for the position to administer a new law, The Mother’s Aid Law. This Law was designed to do away with orphan asylums and support women with dependent children whose husbands were dead, disabled, jailed or had deserted their families and per the law provide aid that “be sufficient to enable the mothers to bring up their children properly in their own homes.”

Governor David Walsh appointed Elizabeth Moloney as the first Supervisor of Mother’s Aid for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, a position she held until she retired in 1943 at the age of 70. In the Commonwealth, the state group (run by the Department of Public Welfare) cooperated with local boards to administer the program. A 1931 federal report documenting the first two decades of Mother’s Aid said that “the progress in public provision for dependent children that enables mothers to care for them in their own homes has been one of the most significant developments in the field of public welfare during the last two decades… [the program provides] recognition of the essential values of home life in rearing of children and acceptance of the principle that no child should be separated form his family because of poverty alone.” This same report shows the average monthly grant in Massachusetts was the most of any state ($69.31).

Map from 1926 Children’s Bureau Report showing administraion of Mother’s Aid programs

Mother’s Aid evolved into Aid to Families with Dependent Children which is known now as Temporary Assistance to Needy Families (TANF).

Elizabeth was active in the women’s suffrage movement, was a charter member of the League of Women Voters, and a supporter of legislation to raise the compulsory school education age to sixteen, reduce hours of labor in factories, prevent children from engaging in factory work, and other important social legislation. In 1927 Elizabeth was elected as the employee representative to the State Retirement Board. She was the first woman elected to this Board and served until 1936.

When she retired, Elizabeth and her husband Francis moved to Jamaica Plain. She resided at 49 Prince Street in JP until her death in 1950.

Information and image supplied by Peg and Kevin Moloney, August 2022

Additional Sources:

Mother’s Aid 1931 report, U.S. Department of Labor publication no. 220

Public aid to mothers with dependent children: extent and fundamental principles, Children’s Bureau publication no. 162, Emma Lundberg, 1928