Lydia Pinkham Is Her Name

Lydia Pinkham Is Her Name Book Description

IS HER NAME BY JEAN BURTON ILLUSTRATED NEW YORK-1949 FARRAR, STRAUS AND COMPANY Burton iTkoluding the rights to reproditce book y or portions thereof, in any form. Designed by Stefan Salter Manufactured in the United States of America By J. J. Little and Ives Company, New York LYDIA PINKHAM IS HER NAME LYDIA ESTES PINK ham, who was torn twenty miles from Boston but seldom traveled that far, found it possible within a narrow orbit to pursue a life full of mental and moral stimulation. Faced with two simultaneous crises her hus bands bankruptcy and a nationwide financial panic she rose to the occasion more than adequately by founding an enterprise that was unique in its time and may be so considered still. She became, as all the world soon knew, Americas first successful busi nesswoman, and she introduced an entirely new kind of advertising which was at the same time a satisfying form of self-expression. She wrote the first reliable facts-of-life treatise distributed by the millions, its effect was incalculable. But her main contribution to public thought was a truly revolu LYDIA PINKHAM tionary concept namely, that one could be healthy though female. Mrs. Pinlcham was fully aware of these varied distinctions and she regarded them calmly. For one thing, she came of a long line of New England Quakers whose women had always been considered, theoretically at least, equal partners with men. For another, it was no new experience for her to be in the public eye. She was born Lydia Estes on February 9, 1819, in a farmhouse outside Lynn, which might sound dull but was not. Her parents, William and Rebecca Estes, were a well-to-do and militandy independent minded pair whose interests fortunatelycoincided. The Estes genealogy traced the origin of the family to a scion of the Italian house of Este who, having backed the wrong side in an inter-city feud, found it prudent to remove himself as far as England. The first of his descendants to arrive in America some centuries later, around 1676, was Matthew Estes of Dover, a master mariner and a Quaker. When he died he left sizable properties in both Lynn and Salem, and these were divided between his male and female heirs with scrupulous impartiality. LYDJA PJNKHAM To granddaughter Philadelphia, daughter of my son John, when eighteen, a feather bed, bedstead and furniture, my silver cuf, 2 silver s poons 9 a black trunk, a gilt trunk and 5 in money. To granddaughter Hannah, daughter of my son John, when eighteen, my silver tankard, two silver spoons, i Hack and i yellow trunk, gilt, and 5 also movable gifts out of the estate at Salem The bulk of the houses and land went to Johns family but if he die leaving a widow, then all to go to her and said children When John died in 1723, administration was accordingly granted his widow, a highly unusual proceeding. But Hannah proved quite equal to her new responsibilities. c Hannah, widow of John Estes, late of Lynn, de ceased, having a right of improvement to the above premises by virtue of the will of my f ather-in-law Matthew Estes, do quitclaim the same she would set forth precisely. Under the common law, women were not, in the legal sense, persons but from the earliest records, Estes wives, widows and daughters comported themselves just as if they were persons witnessing documents, buying and selling, keeping LYDIA PINJCHAM little shops of one kind or another in the home, makinginventories, and shrewdly managing prop erties that were steadily growing in extent. By the third generation, what with tireless clearing of stony ground and draining of swamps, they had ac cumulated a considerable acreage, as well as houses and livestock. Estes husbands and wives made a point of deeding property jointly whenever occasion arose, and it frequently happened that a man would appoint his wife sole executrix of his will...

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