In American households, it is mostly women — as mothers, wives, elder daughters, grandmothers, or domestic workers — who do the work required to maintain and increase the wellbeing of everyone in the home. Their unpaid ...

In the fall of 1836, Harriot Curtis opened a letter to her friend and suitor, Hezikiah Wead, with a statement about the boundless sense of independence she cherished. “Alone, I am fancy free,” she declared, “… with the ...