#ch: florence russell

[oscarisaacss-wp]

12 DAYS OF GIFMAS… DAY 12, your ocs + representation (pt. 1, pt. 2).

elle davies / kiss with a fist — ashkenazi jewish, israeli, bicurious, anxiety disorder

alita byrnes / black magic — biracial, creole, irish, anxiety disorder

eddie carmichael / kiss with a fist — biracial, bisexual, nigerian, depression

tess bakalova / foreigner’s god — cuban, ocd, borderline personality disorder, bilingual

nora cleary / strangeness & charm — biracial, chinese, italian, perfectionism, demiromantic

yesenia denver / lost myths — biracial, chinese, bisexual, ptsd, anxiety disorder, depression, secondhand trauma

irina makara / devil’s tears — maori, chinese, cook island maori, pansexual

florence russell / black magic — biracial, african-american, indigenous canadian, bisexual

maya daud / angel with a shotgun — anxiety, biracial, somali, norwegian, bicurious, depression

holly venari / the sun & other metaphors — ashkenazi jewish, anxiety disorder, schizophrenic, adhd

[dolphingirlfriend]

reading 1 - ch 13 of america’s women: 400 years of dolls, drudges, helpmates, and heroines by gail collins

turn of the century: the arrival of the new woman “to demonstrate publicly that women do have legs”

1895 frances willard - head of women’s christian temperance union wrote how i learned to ride the bicycle - she learned at age 53

bicycles were becoming very popular in America, especially with American women who were thrilled by them

women who bicycled were called “new women” - advertisers tried to sell Rubifoam tooth powder or Sweeperette carpet sweeper

1895 life published a tale about the man of the future, who sits darning socks while “two noisy, sturdy girls, as aggressive as became their sex, romped merrily about the sewing room.”

very few women had the right to vote - women founded settlement houses to help the urban poor, organized unions, demonstrated for the right to vote, and investigated everything from unsanitary dairies to oil trusts

grace harlow, outdoor girls - heroines in books

new women was young and old - lillian russell, elizabeth cady stanton, susan b. anthony were more popular than when they were younger. 

rose pastor, a jewish cigar factory worker who married a j.g phelps stokes and converted him to socialism

alva belmont, a socialite, she divorced her husband william vanderbilt - and married oliver belmont - divorce was in the highest in the united states - the trend was strong in the rest

“less about soul and more about pimples”

physical ideal of the turn of the century American woman was the gibson girl

like the gilded age beauties the gibson girl had a full bust and hips but her body was thinner, firmer, elongated - tall and sporty - “wholesome athletic air that does not smack too much of athletics” - lillie langtry

“whenever she was disturbed or depressed she would move the furniture”

jane addams - the pioner of the settlement house movement, reformer, writer, and peace activist 

they achieved domesticity in the hull house not with a husband and children, but with other women - her and ellen starr raised funds to find a place for a settlement

they established the first playground in chicago, a nursery school, women’s clubs, lecture series, art exhibits

had more than fifty rooms, endless classes that occupied every corner of the house for twelve hours a day it was open

they organized demonstrations against bad health conditions

1907 hull house was 13 buildings

“i fought the rats, inside and out”

labor union leaders were indifferent or hostile to women workers - regarded them as people who should be home with children - or as surplus labor who took away men’s money

mother jones - marry harris in cork, ireland - she trained to be a dressmaker and teacher - married an ironworker named george jones. yellow fever struck the city of memphis in 1867 - killed her husband and four children. 

she moved to chicago - she survived the great chicago fire but all of her stuff was destroyed

she joined the labor movement - she traveled all the time. she was an equal opportunity organized and welcomed black workers, women and children, and wives of miners. 

“I am now surrounded by all my dreams come true”

women didn’t have opportunities to mkae a lot of money

ida tarbell had a useful and lucrative job - she was a descendant of one of the first victims of the salem witch trials (rebecca nurse). she was an investigative reporter. she would go anywhere to follow a lead.

her most famous work “the history of the standard oil company” was an expose on corporate greed 

florence nightingale graham - became elizabeth arden 

harriet hubbard ayer - divorced mother - ex husband and daughter had her committed to an asylum

sarah breedlove / madam c.j walker - daughter of sharecroppers, first child to be born free. she started off doing laundry - which meant bearing clothes and standing for hours with hands in hot water and lye 

“tell me, pretty maiden are there more at home like you?”

middle class girls -- dreamed of journalists, helping the poor

working class- imagined being on stage, a chorus girl was a New Woman too. the dream was to be assertive and independent, and have fancy dinners, expensive gifts - most of them lived unglamorous lives 

floradora girls - all six of the originals married millionaires 

classic “training camp” for the New Woman was a college campus - first generation of college students who were female was 1870

dr. edward clarke from harvard medical school wrote about women endangering their “female apparatus” by going to college  - a decade later 40k women were in college. 

women students were serious - florence kelly said her freshman year at cornless ‘one of continual joy’ 

when the university of chicago discovered that the proportion of women had risen from 25-50 percent - they developed a curriculum aimed at attracting more men. 

at cornell women could not join student organizations - large state school restricted women to home economics and teaching courses

“smashed”

most women who attended college went to coed, but the all female private colleges had more graduates who went into politics, social work and academia 

spring proms at all girls schools ‘freshman frolic’ - sophomore is assigned a freshman to be a ‘cavalier’ too. colleges banned pictures.

hero worship - young women felt for teachers ‘took on sexual overtones’ - apparently jane addams sexuality will ‘never be known’ - but she never had a relationship with a man... um, ok

“race suicide”

jane addams was asked why most women in her circle had never married, she said that men ‘didn’t want to marry the new type of women’ - because they wanted housekeeping. women did not feel they could be both housekeepers and careers (mhm)

educated women opted for jobs over husbands, nearly half of all female college graduates in the late 19th century remained unmarried

“golden age of the American single woman” - one woman says - ‘I never married because I never met a man whose love covered the faults in his character which I was sure would make me unhappy.”  - they had a new opportunity to work

white middle class worried about ‘race suicide’ - not giving birth to more white babies (yikes)

g. stanley hall - if women do not improve, men have to look for immigrant wives or perhaps undertake a ‘new rape of the Sabines’

“life is too short to spend it digesting pork”

ellen swallow richards, founder of science of home economics

graduated from vassar and wanted to go to get an advanced chemistry degree at mit - they eventually allowed her to enroll. she mended her professors shirts and swept the laboratory floors 

they never gave her any degree higher than another b.s - but she married one of her professors - robert hallowell richards, a specialist in metallurgy- he opposed coeducation at mit - which he said introcued “feelings, interests foreign to the lecture room”

she taught people and analyzed the ingredients in women’s work - the boston cooking school offered bacteriology and the chemistry of soap - and home economics became an academic discipline.

became a way for women who didn’t want to be at home - by 1914 - more than 250 colleges offered home econ - and women were able to take chemistry, biology, geology (because it would make them better homemakers)

by the 1890s anything scientific was regarded as a good thing

food was supposed to have a lot of colors - and hand carved veggies floating in liquids were favorable (ew)

john watson wanted to protect children from ‘smothering mother love’ - regarded children as a little machine that should be oiled and greased but otherwise let alone (this is stupid)

women and economics - popular book

“has such a thing ever happened... before?”

ww1 in 1914 - american women were crossing the ocean and volunteering to serve as nurses, canteen hostesses, ambulance drivers, switchboard operates- 25k women made the trip

200k black servicemen overseas - ignored by white female volunteers - black women offered to help, but were rebuffed by white officials

2k black nurses volunteered but American officials did not want to find accomodations.