1860-1935
Feminist Writer and Lecturer

Background.

Charlotte rerkins Gilman, one of the most prominent lecturers and social critics of the 1900s, was born in Hartford, Connecticut, into one of the most intellectually prestigious families in the United States. Her father was the nephew of Henry Ward Beecher and Harriet Beecher Stowe, and was the brother-in-law of Edward Everett Hale. Gilman had a difficult childhood. Her father left the household in 1866, and Gilman grew up fatherless with her mother dependent on family members for support. Gilman later recalled her great-aunt Harriet Beecher Stowe fondly and early on chose her as a role model. Although she had a somewhat limited formal education, Gilman was a voracious reader from the age of fifteen. At seventeen she requested from her distant father Frederick Perkins, author of The Best Reading (1877), a list of books to read. He replied with a...