Mary H. Harvey was born around 1840 in St. Johnsbury, Vermont, to Orange and Martha Harvey. Her father was a laborer. She grew up in St. Johnsbury, and by 1860, she was working as a servant. She married Prescott Buckminster on June 12, 1861, and they had at least two children: Lillian, born around 1862; and Ira, born around 1866. They lived in Concord, Vermont, and her husband worked as a physician. Her husband died on June 21, 1877, and she married James C. Hanno on May 20, 1880. They moved to Fitchburg, Massachusetts, in the late 1800s, and her husband worked as a comb maker. Hanno died on June 6, 1900. By 1920, she was living with her son Ira in Beverly, Massachusetts. She died there on June 10, 1926, “after a short illness.”