biography
| name: |
Beecher, Catharine E(sther)
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| sex:
| female
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| lived:
| (1800–78)
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| biography:
| Educator and writer, born in East Hampton, New York, USA. The daughter of Lyman Beecher and sister of Harriet Beecher Stowe, she was the eldest of eight surviving children. Educated at home and in private school, in 1821 she began teaching and went through a religious crisis brought on by her father's attempt to force his Calvinist views on her. After her fiance's death (1823), she founded the Hartford Female Seminary, launching a life-long campaign as lecturer, writer, and advocate for women's education. In 1831 she left her Hartford school and later founded similar schools for young women in Cincinnati and Milwaukee to promote female education in the West, and founded the American Women's Education Association (1852). Her goal was to rescue women who wasted their lives in frivolous ‘feminine’ pursuits as well as those exploited as factory hands, but her ideal woman was one who presided over an intelligent, cultured, well-managed household. Among her many published works was Treatise of Domestic Economy (1841), and she collaborated with her sister Harriet Beecher Stowe on a new edition, retitled The American Woman's Home (1869) which became a hugely influential guide for generations of American housewives. Although she was in the forefront on many social issues of her day, she did not believe that women should be involved in political affairs and she opposed woman suffrage. |
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