Florence Breed Khan

Florence M. Breed was born in Lynn, Massachusetts, the daughter of Francis W. Breed and Alice Ives Breed.[1] Her father was a shoe manufacturer. Her mother, an active clubwoman, was also a Bahá'i convert, introduced to the faith by suffragist Mary Hanford Ford.

Breed, who acted as a young woman and studied Eastern religions and texts,[2] married a Persian diplomat, Mirza Ali Kuli Khan, in 1904.[3][4] They met when he was lecturing at Harvard University.[5] Following his diplomatic career, they lived in Washington, D.C.,[6] San Francisco,[7] Paris, Tehran, Istanbul, and Tbilisi.[8]

Khan was a society hostess in Washington while her husband was the Persian chargé d'affaires there.[9][10] "I find that few Americans, even traveled and cultured ones, know Persian as it deserves to be appreciated," she told an interviewer in 1910.[11] The Khan family greeted Bahá'i leader ‘Abdu’l-Bahá on his arrival in Washington in 1912,[12] and hosted a luncheon for him, with guests including Louis Gregory.[13] She contributed Persian recipes to The Economy Administration Cookbook (1913).[14] In 1914, she and her husband attended the Panama-Pacific International Exposition in San Francisco, representing Persia.[15] She was an occasional lecturer on Persia to community groups.[16]

Florence Breed and Ali Kuli Khan had three children, Rahim (born 1905), Marzieh (1908–1993),[17] and Hamideh (1910–1989).[11] Florence Breed Khan died in 1950, in Teaneck, New Jersey, in her seventies.[18] Their daughter Marzieh Gail published a series of family memoirs, Other People, Other Places (1982), Summon up Remembrance (1987), and Arches of the Years (1991).[19][20][21]