What would you do with your life if, for the first time in history, you had a choice? That’s the big question that Amy and guest reviewer Lisa Ard tackle in today’s 1894 novel, A Bachelor Maid by Mrs. Burton Harrison. This forgotten Gilded Age romance explores many relevant themes that 21st century women are still struggling with, plus Amy introduces the next-generation Gibson Girl model, Charles Dana Gibson’s daughter Babs!
Topics and shout-outs in this episode include: Charles Dana Gibson, the Gibson Girl, Irene Gibson Emery, the Gilded Age, the Woman Question, women’s rights, spinsters, working women, Helen Reddy, Jane Austen, Pearl S. Buck, To Kill a Mockingbird, middle-grade fiction, the Civil War, Reconstruction, divorce, property rights, emancipation, suffrage, and the Nineteenth Amendment.
