Kentucky Women - (Southern Women: Their Lives and Times) by Melissa a McEuen & Thomas H Appleton (Paperback)

Book Synopsis

Kentucky Women: Their Lives and Times introduces a history as dynamic and diverse as Kentucky itself. Covering the Appalachian region in the east to the Pennyroyal in the west, the essays highlight women whose aspirations, innovations, activism, and creativity illustrate Kentucky's role in political and social reform, education, health care, the arts, and cultural development. The collection features women with well-known names as well as those whose lives and work deserve greater attention.

Shawnee chief Nonhelema Hokolesqua, western Kentucky slave Matilda Lewis Threlkeld, the sisters Emilie Todd Helm and Mary Todd Lincoln, reformers Madeline McDowell Breckinridge and Laura Clay, activists Anne McCarty Braden and Elizabeth Fouse, politicians Georgia Davis Powers and Martha Layne Collins, sculptor Enid Yandell, writer Harriette Simpson Arnow, and entrepreneur Nancy Newsom Mahaffey are covered in Kentucky Women, representing a broad cross section of those who forged Kentucky's relationship with the American South and the nation at large.

With essays on frontier life, gender inequality in marriage and divorce, medical advances, family strife, racial challenges and triumphs, widowhood, agrarian culture, urban experiences, educational theory and fieldwork, visual art, literature, and fame, the contributors have shaped a history of Kentucky that is both grounded and groundbreaking.

Review Quotes

[A]n engaging, intriguing foray into Kentucky's feminine past. Meticulously sourced and short on romanticism, Kentucky Women depicts life as it was for those coming of age in a time where fighting for justice, compassion or one's survival was an inherent part of the female experience.-- "Kentucky Monthly"

Dr. Appleton and Dr. McEuen have done an admirable job in covering all areas of the commonwealth to show the remarkable achievements of women in Kentucky history, economics, politics, and the arts. . . . This book finally fills a void in the research and writing of Kentucky history.--Duane Bolin "Murray Ledger & Times"

How have women shaped Kentucky history? This well-edited collection of seventeen essays provides an answer in biographical form, profiling twenty-three notable women. Their stories span three centuries and encompass an ambitious range of topics. . .--Penny Messinger "Journal of Southern History"

The breadth of coverage, whether calculated by the women studied, methodological approaches, chronological eras, or discipline, is remarkable.--Lorri Glover "author of Founders as Fathers: The Private Lives and Politics of the American Revolutionaries"

This absorbing book features the stories of fascinating women who contributed in diverse and profound ways to Kentucky and to the nation--it ought to be read far beyond the borders of the Bluegrass State.--Stacy Cordery "author of Juliette Gordon Low: The Remarkable Founder of the Girl Scouts"

About the Author

Melissa A. McEuen (Editor)
MELISSA A. MCEUEN is professor of history at Transylvania University. She is the author of the award-winning Seeing America: Women Photographers between the Wars and Making War, Making Women: Femininity and Duty on the American Home Front, 1941-1945 (Georgia).

Thomas H. Appleton Jr. (Editor)
THOMAS H. APPLETON JR. formerly served as editor-in-chief of publications for the Kentucky Historical Society. Since 2000, he has been professor of history at Eastern Kentucky University. He has coedited five books, including Negotiating Boundaries of Southern Womanhood: Dealing with the Powers That Be and Searching for Their Places: Women in the South across Four Centuries.