Amelia Bloomer

    She was an American activist for women’s rights. Who is she? Amelia Jenks Bloomer was her name. Amelia Jenks was born in Homer, New York on May 27, 1818. She was a very famous for women’s right and for being a reformer. Amelia was also a school teacher, which led her to meeting her husband, whose name is Dexter C. Bloomer. (She was 22 when she got married.) Her husband was a lawyer and a part time owner of the Seneca Falls Country Courier. Her new husband encouraged her to write for the paper. In 1849, Amelia began writing a newspaper called The Lily. Articles in The Lily were mostly about temperance. (Temperance is an effort to get people not to drink alcohol.) The Lily had about 6,000 subscribers. Eventually Amelia started writing about women's rights, such as unequal educational opportunities, hateful marriage and property laws, and suffrage (the right to vote) for women. The Lily supported a change in women’s dress. Amelia wanted to do away with the long dresses and corsets. She thought women should wear shorter dresses with something that resembled baggie pants underneath. The pants came to be know as "bloomers." They never really became popular but people still remember Amelia for the "bloomers." Sadly, Amelia Jenks Bloomer died on December 31, 1894 in Council Bluff, Iowa. We think Mrs. Bloomer was an amazing woman. Don’t you think she is incredible?

Image courtesy of http://www.fashion-era.com

For more information:
http://worlddmc.ohiolink.edu/OMP/NewDetails?oid=1038438&scrapid=19265&format=yourscrap&sort=thedate&searchstatus=0&count=1&hits=1
http://www.cwrl.utexas.edu/~ulrich/RHE309/vicfembios/ameliabloomer.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amelia_Bloomer
http://homepages.rootsweb.com/~gonfishn/bhopci/b/bloomera.html
http://www.greatwomen.org/women.php?action=viewone&id=22
http://www.nps.gov/wori/lily.htm

By Alexandra & Anita, fourth grade, 2006

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