Midwestern Women: Work, Community, and Leadership at the Crossroads [Paperback]

. . . an excellent introduction to a complex subject. Anyone interested in the Midwest or in women's history will find it a valuable resource. Agricultural History

. . . the volume as a whole invigorates the field of midwestern history. Wisconsin Magazine of History

. . . examines four centuries of Midwestern women's history, including urban and rural, frontier settlers and American Indians, Mexican and European migrants. The book mixes telling anecdotes with scholarly research. Indianapolis Star

Writing about four centuries of midwestern women's history, including urban, rural, and frontier women, Native Americans, African Americans, Mexicanas, as well as European migrants, essayists discuss ways midwestern women's lives resemble those women of other regions and ways in which their lives are distinctive. By addressing a broad range of questions about the lives of midwestern women this volume encourages further research of this neglected but important group. The volume also includes a lengthy bibliography.

Addresses the long-neglected question of women and midwestern regional identity.

Lucy Eldersveld Murphy, Assistant Professor of History at DePaul University in Chicago, has published articles on Native American women and women artisans in midwestern history.
Wendy Hamand Venet, Assistant Professor of History at Georgia State University, is author of Neither Ballots nor Bullets: Women Abolitionists and the Civil War.

Foreword by Glenda Riley

Introduction: The Strange Career of Madame Dubuque and Midwestern Women's History
Wendy Hamand Venet and Lucy Eldersveld Murphy

I. Four Lives

1. Leadership within the Women's Community: Susie Bonga Wright of the Leech Lake Ojibwe
Rebecca Kugel

2. Journeywoman Milliner: Emily Austin, Migration, and Women's Work in the Nineteenth Century Midwest
Lucy Eldersveld Murphy

3. Mary McDowell and Municipal Housekeeping: Women's Political³…