Tyler May &

Meg Tirado

Women in public life

• To keep children safe and there husbands rested upper and middle class women felt obligated to make their home a place of refuge. From the excitement and the distractions of the outside world

• However poor women had no other choice but to work hard either in the home or outside of it

FARM WOMEN• Perform such tasks as cooking, cleaning, and sewing, if there husbands were ill or absent

they had to plow, plant the fields and harvest the crops

DOMESTIC WORKERS• Shortly after African Americans were freed from slavery poverty drove them into the work

force• In 1890 one million African American women held jobs. While 38% of them labored on

farms 46% toiled as domestic servants • African American women filled positions such as cooks, maids, laundresses, and scrub

women• Unmarried immigrant women often did domestic labor

Women in the work force

WOMEN IN INDUSTRY• In tobacco industries nearly 40% of the employees

were women• They also worked in canaries, book binderies, in

packing plants, and commercial laundries• As opportunities expanded women started to fill jobs

in offices, stores, and classrooms. (these jobs required a high school education)

• By 1890 women high school graduates out number men's

WOMEN IN HIGHER EDUCATION

• Many of the women who became active in public live attended women colleges.

• Though Columbia, Brown, and Harvard colleges refused to admit women each of the universities established a separate college for them

• When women started to attend college marriage was no longer the only alternative

• Almost half of all college educated women in the late 19th century were never married.

• Most educated women started to apply their skills to needed social reforms.

Women in Reform• Women often strove to improve conditions at work and

home, because they we not allowed to vote or hold office• The NACW, National association of Colored Women, was

founded in 1896.

The Fight for the Vote• Suffrage is the right to vote• Prominent leaders of the suffrage crusade included Anthony,

Elizabeth caddy Stanton, Lousy Stone, Julia Ward Howe• During reconstruction the 14th and 15th amendment granted

black men the right to vote.• Some women approved of the amendments however some

disproved because of the exclusion of women

A Three Part strategy for suffrage • These suffrage leaders tried three different approaches to

achieve there objective– First they convinced legislators to give women the right to

vote– Second women challenged the 14th amendment.– Thirdly women pursed for another amendment which in

turn would give them the right to vote• In 1876 the senate committee killed the Anthony

amendment• Women tried for the next 18 years to try and have it

reintroduced• Despite the three pronged approach the women suffrage

achieved only modest success.