19th Century Women

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19th-Century Women

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Women in the nineteenth century, for the most part, had to follow the common role presented to them by society. This role can be summed up by what historians call the “cult of domesticity”. The McGuffey Readers does a successful job at illustrating the women’s role in society. Women that took part in the overland trail as described in “Women’s Diaries of the Westward Journey” had to try to follow these roles while facing many challenges that made it very difficult to do so.

One of the most common expectations for women then is that they are responsible for doing the chore of cleaning whether it is cleaning the house, doing the laundry. The McGuffey Readers mentions the women’s duty to clean in a multiple places. In this handbook it gives clear directions to the woman on what she is to do when cleaning, “This ceremony completed, and the house thoroughly evacuated, the next operation is to smear the wall and ceilings with brushes dipped into a solution of lime… (Gorn 111).” The book explains how it is the women’s job to thoroughly clean the house once a year in a manner that sounds very laborious! It further states, “The misfortune is, that the sole object is to make things clean (Gorn 112).” In this part of the book it is very clear that it is saying that the woman’s duty is to clean. In Women’s Diaries of the Westward Journey it illustrates this in a couple of passages. For example, one woman wrote in her diary, “Oh! Horrors how shall I express it; it is the dreaded washing day . . . but washing must be done and procrastination won’t do it for me (Schlissel 83).” Although this woman obviously did not like doing the washing she saw it as her job to do. In addition, the book describes this scene, “The banks of a river would be lined with women who carried their kettles, their washtubs, and piles of unwashed linen (Schlissel 82).” Again, it is the women who are doing the cleaning. The McGuffey Readers being the handbook that young girls would read in school taught them that it was their place to do the cleaning. It is apparent that they took that into consideration as shown by the Women’s Diaries and even today is seen as their role.

Women were a nurturing part of the household and therefore it was seen as their job to take care of the children. For example, the editor of the McGuffey’s states, “the middle-class...

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...s of the journey were of such extremes that they made the travels skip something that they were forced to believe was a very important ritual.

Since people could not run around naked someone had to make the clothes or buy them and that was the women. “And the mother mends Harry’s stockings (Gorn 49).” Once again it states the “mother” as the one doing this chore. The women on the trail though it shows had little time to care about mending clothes, “The majority of the overland women wore what clothing they had and prayed that what they wore would not tear. They were too preoccupied with the necessities of the day to consider fashion at all (Schlissel 105).” I would be happy if I were these women because that just means one less chore that was their “duty” to perform.

In conclusion, the woman of the Victorian Era had her role in life planned out from before she was born. Although it was a dreadful role these women carried it out in a way that shows their purity of the heart and willingness to do so many of things for others and for little return. They were truly a remarkable testament to hard work and ingenuity of the time that even the men of the time could have learned from.

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