Dawn Keetley and John Pettegrew (Essay Date 1997)

SOURCE: Keetley, Dawn and John Pettegrew. "Introduction: Part I: Identities through Adversity." In Public Women, Public Words: A Documentary History of American Feminism, edited by Dawn Keetley and John Pettegrew, pp. 3-7. Madison, Wis.: Madison House Publishers, 1997.

In the following essay, Keetley and Pettegrew discuss the challenges that women colonial dissenters faced.

The first European settlers in New England brought with them family structure that vested authority unambiguously in the hands of the father. Woman's place in this "patriarchal" institution was clearly delimited; less autonomous individuals than wives and mothers, women throughout the North American colonies were subject to an intricately organized hierarchy that placed them below father, husband, brothers, and even adult sons. Unable to inherit either the land or the offices of their fathers, women became virtually invisible in the public life of the thirteen colonies. With its strict...