|
Amelia Jenks Bloomer (May 27, 1818—December 30, 1894) was an American women's rights and temperance advocate. Image File history File links Bloomera. ...
May 27 is the 147th day (148th in leap years) of the year in the Gregorian calendar, with 218 days remaining. ...
1818 (MDCCCXVIII) is a common year starting on Thursday of the Gregorian calendar or a common year starting on Saturday of the 12-day slower Julian calendar. ...
December 30 is the 364th day of the year (365th in leap years) in the Gregorian Calendar, with 1 day remaining. ...
1894 (MDCCCXCIV) was a common year starting on Monday (see link for calendar). ...
The term women’s rights typically refers to freedoms inherently possessed by women and girls of all ages, which may be institutionalized or ignored and/or illegitimately suppressed by law or custom in a particular society. ...
A cartoon from Australia ca. ...
Bloomer came from a family of modest means and received only a few years of formal schooling. When she was 22, she married attorney Dexter Bloomer who encouraged her to write for his New York newspaper, the Seneca Falls County Courier.
Bloomer and her family moved to Iowa in 1852. She died at Council Bluffs, Iowa. 1852 was a leap year starting on Thursday (see link for calendar). ...
Satellite photo showing Council Bluffs and Omaha, Nebraska Council Bluffs is the county seat of Pottawattamie County, Iowa, United States on the east bank of the Missouri River. ...
Social activism
In 1848, Bloomer attended the Woman's Rights Convention at Seneca Falls. In 1849, Bloomer began publishing her views on temperance and social issues in her own bi-weekly publication, The Lily. While the newspaper initially focused on temperance, Bloomer came under the influence of temperance activist and suffragette Elizabeth Cady Stanton who contributed articles on the broader issues of women's rights. The newspaper contained a broad mix of contents ranging from recipes to moralist tracts, including topics such as marriage law reform and higher education for women. In publication through 1853, The Lily eventually had a circulation of over 4,000. This newspaper is believed to have been a model for later periodicals focused on women's suffrage. 1849 was a common year starting on Monday (see link for calendar). ...
Suffragette with banner, Washington DC, 1918 The title of suffragette (also occasionally spelled suffraget) was given to members of the womens suffrage movement in the United Kingdom. ...
Elizabeth Cady Stanton (November 12, 1815 – October 26, 1902) was an American social activist and leading figure of the early womens rights movement. ...
The term womens suffrage is a social, economic and political reform movement aimed at extending suffrage — the right to vote — to women. ...
Bloomer, describing her feelings as the first woman to own, operate and edit a news vehicle for women, wrote:
- It was a needed instrument to spread abroad the truth of a new gospel to woman, and I could not withhold my hand to stay the work I had begun. I saw not the end from the beginning and dreamed where to my propositions to society would lead me.
In her publication, Bloomer promoted a change in dress standards for women that would be less restrictive in regular activities. Image File history File links Bloomer. ...
Image File history File links Bloomer. ...
- The costume of women should be suited to her wants and necessities. It should conduce at once to her health, comfort, and usefulness; and, while it should not fail also to conduce to her personal adornment, it should make that end of secondary importance.
In 1851, New England temperance activist Elizabeth Smith Miller (aka Libby Miller) adopted what she considered a more rational costume: loose trousers gathered at the ankles, like women's trousers worn in the Middle East and Central Asia, topped by a short dress or skirt and vest. The costume was worn publicly by actress Fanny Kemble. Miller displayed her new clothing to Stanton, her cousin, who found it sensible and becoming, and adopted it immediately. In this garb Stanton visited Bloomer, who began to wear the costume and promote it enthusiastically in her magazine. Articles on the clothing trend were picked up in The New York Tribune. More women wore the fashion which was promptly dubbed The Bloomer Costume or "Bloomers". However, the Bloomers were subjected to ceaseless ridicule in the press and harassment on the street. Bloomer herself dropped the fashion in 1859, saying that a new invention, the crinoline, was a sufficient reform that she could return to conventional dress. Fanny Kemble as a young girl Frances Anne Kemble (Fanny Kemble) (1809 - 1893), the actress and author, was Charles Kembles elder daughter; she was born in London, and educated chiefly in France. ...
1850s fashion bloomers 1851 caricature of fashion bloomers as being similar to Turkish attire An example of late 19th-century / Edwardian athletic bloomers: the Smith College class of 1902 basketball team 1890s caricature of athletic bloomers as leading women to adopt masculine habits Bloomers is a word which has been...
crinoline patented Cutaway view of a crinoline, Punch magazine, August 1856 Sequence of posed joke photographs of five stages of putting on a crinoline, ca. ...
Bloomer remained a suffrage pioneer and writer throughout her life, writing for a wide array of periodicals. She led suffrage campaigns in Nebraska and Iowa, and served as president of the Iowa Woman Suffrage Association from 1871 until 1873. 1871 (MDCCCLXXI) was a common year starting on Sunday (see link for calendar). ...
1873 (MDCCCLXXIII) was a common year starting on Wednesday (see link for calendar). ...
References - Bloomer, Dexter C. Life and Writings of Amelia Bloomer. Boston: Arena Pub. Co., 1895. NOTES: Reprinted 1975 by Schocken Books, New York. Includes bibliographical references.
- Coon, Anne C. Hear Me Patiently: The Reform Speeches of Amelia Jenks Bloomer, Vol. 138. Greenwood Publishing Group, Inc., 1994.
- Smith, Stephanie, Household Words: Bloomers, sucker, bombshell, scab, cyber (2006) -- material on changing usage of words.
- The Lily: A Ladies' Journal, devoted to Temperance and Literature. 1849.
See also During the middle and late Victorian period, various reformers proposed, designed, and wore clothing supposedly more rational and comfortable than the fashions of the time. ...
External links |
Feeds |
Contact