Tuesday, January 10, 2006

"A Good Poor Man's Wife"

"A Good Poor Man's Wife" Claudia L. Bushman (1998 edition) - I picked this up because Peggy R. mentioned that Harriet Hanson Robinson, the subject of this biography, was the sister of Rev. J.W. Hanson a rather prolific Universalist writer, who still has books in print, 100 years after his death.
Despite being named John Wesley Hanson, it seems his parents were raised Quaker and Congregational, although after the death of his father, their mother attended Universalist services. Mrs. Robinson, best known for her work on women's sufferage and rights, moved around religiously, her family being friends of Emerson. She and her daughter ended up Episcopalian, and against women's sufferage.
The book itself is very well done, based on diaries and scrapbooks -- a nice view of life for the middle class of the 1800s- early 1900s.