Duty of American Women.
Beecher’s Foundational Educational Tract
[Beecher, Catharine.] The Duty of American Women to their Country. New York: Harper & Brothers, 1845.
16to.; brown cloth; stamped in gilt; light wear.
First edition. A presentation copy, inscribed to prominent Ohio lawyer William Griswold Lane on the front endpaper: To the Hon/Judge Lane/With the respects of/the author; with the numbered bookplate of his granddaughter, Elizabeth Griswold Lane Moss, tipped in to the front cover, and the copy number (768) in ink on the copyright page; with three sets of ads totaling 16pp. in the rear.
The Duty of American Women to Their Country popularized Beecher as a speaker in small-town ladies’ clubs, particularly in upstate New York and in the Midwest. In it, Beecher argues for free public education to protect the still-new democracy, and urges young women to pursue careers as teachers.
As a result of her book, societies were organized in Boston and Cleveland, Ohio, for the purpose of sending young East Coast women to the West as teachers, which would go on to place more than 500 female teachers in the western frontier region of the country. In 1852, Beecher would establish the American Woman's Educational Association to prepare young Western women to become teachers in their own communities. It is likely that Lane, a respected judge in Erie County, Ohio, was supportive of Beecher and the Cleveland societies.
The book’s structure is worth noting, with headers on pp. 3-112 reading “American Women!” and “Will you save your country!” The second section, on pp. 113-148, is titled “A Plan Proposed,” and prints different headers on each page, among them “Want of Good Teachers,” “What Can Be Done,” and “Committees of Ladies.” This formatting extends into the last chapters, broken into “Note A” and “Note B” and printing “religious trainings” followed by a brief synopsis of Beecher’s earlier work, A Treatise on Domestic Economy.
Sources:
[ed. Cullen-DuPont, Kathryn.] Encyclopedia of Women’s History in America. New York: Facts on File, 1996.
[ed. Frost-Knappman, Elizabeth.] Women’s Suffrage in America. New York: Facts on File, 2004.
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