Synopses & Reviews
Recounting the story of America's antebellum woman's rights movement through the efforts of Lucy Stone (1818-1893), this important account differs dramatically from those that focus almost exclusively on Susan B. Anthony or Elizabeth Cady Stanton. Million examines the social forces of the 1830s and 1840s that led Stone to become a woman's reformer and her early agitation as a student at Oberlin College, including what may well be the nation's first strike for equal pay for women. Million chronicles not only the public side of Stone, but her personal battles as well.
Considering a woman's right to self-sovereignty as the central issue of the movement, Stone tried to prove that marriage need not rob a woman of her autonomy. With Henry B. Blackwell, Stone attempted to establish a marriage of truly equal partners, in which she maintained her personal and financial independence. She worked tirelessly during the 1850s, not only as the movement's silver-tongued orator, but also as the organizer and manager of the National Woman's Rights Conventions, champion of coeducation, instigator of nation-wide petitioning efforts, and first person to plead for women's equal legal rights before a body of lawmakers.^LThe contributions of several prominent male leaders are presented, along with coverage of agitation in New England and the western states. Million also details the trials of motherhood that eventually led Stone to pass leadership of the movement to Anthony and Stanton on the eve of the Civil War.
Review
Recommended. General collections, graduate students, faculty. - Choice
Review
The arrival of a new biography of Stone is cause for celebration….one of the most fascinating I have read in a long time. - The Women's Review of Books
Review
The meticulous documentation of the antebellum life and career of Lucy Stone is a truly remarkable achievement. It cannot be surpassed for the thorough charting of Stone's movements, the careful assembling of the correspondence and writings of and about Stone, and the detailed attention to the construction of the woman's rights movement. Nowhere has so much information been brought together on Stone, highlighting her key role in the American woman suffrage movement in its formative years. < p="">Carol Lasser^LProfessor of History, Oberlin College <>
Review
Joelle Million has written a thoroughly researched account of Lucy Stone from childhood until just after the Civil War. The richly detailed, complex portrait that emerges performs an important service in restoring Stone to her rightful place as the guiding force behind the early woman's rights movement. The movement itself is presented in all its diversity from dress reformers to advocates of easier divorce laws to free lovers. < p="">Leslie Wheeler^LEditor of ^ILoving Warriors, Selected Letters of Lucy Stone and Henry B. Blackwell, 1853-1893^R <>
Review
Joelle Million's biography of Lucy Stone is very well-documented, as readers would expect from a scholarly work, but it is so well-written that it reads like a novel. I found the story hard to put down. Million tells the story of Stone's life in engaging and dynamic prose. She also offers a very important addition to our knowledge of the early woman's rights movement, helping us to understand that Stone was one of the major leaders, right next to Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, Lucretia Mott, and Matilda Joslyn Gage, and that debates about the rights of women had a broad geographic and cultural context. < p="">Judith Wellman^LProfessor Emerita, State University of New York, Oswego <>
Review
"Woman's Voice, Woman's Place is delightfully rich in detail. The text is engrossing but also takes time to savor and digest. The inclusion of quotes from Lucy Stone's speeches can make readers wish they could have experienced her powerful oration in person. . . . Both Massachusetts history and women's studies scholars will want to add this title to their reading lists." - Historical Journal of Massachusetts
Synopsis
Includes bibliographical references (p. [315]-320) and index.
Synopsis
The work and influence of one of antebellum America's most famous orators and activists establishes her as the early movement's central figure and driving force.
About the Author
JOELLE MILLION is an independent scholar and historian. She has taught history at Minnesota State University, Mankato.
Table of Contents
Introduction
"Shall Woman's Voice Be Hushed?"
The Making of a Reformer
Learning Woman's Lot
Separate Spheres and Female Education
Rousing Woman's Voice
"The Confounded Woman Question"
A Hand to Be Counted
Oberlin and Universal Reform
The Highest Good
"All Lucy Stone's Doing"
The Power of an Orator
Antislavery Agent
Organizing a Movement
Speaking for Women
Divergent Paths
The Converting Voice
Temperance and Woman's Rights
"A Hearing Ear" in the West
"Heart and Soul"
Testing a Wife's Autonomy
Romance and Politics
Forging a "True Marriage"
The Marriage Question and Woman's Rights
"The Field Is the World"
A "Representative Woman"
The "Path for My Feet"
Taxing Times
Passing the Mantle
Expectancy
Bibliography
Index