Practically every member of the Peale family contributed to America's early art and culture and Sarah Peale was the first woman artist to have made a living from her work. Having learned to paint from her renowned father, she painted several famous people, including Lafayette, Andrew Jackson, Thomas Hart Benson, and Daniel Webster. Sarah was a passionate woman bent on being successful as an artist. She was also a woman of strong passion with a will to love and to be in love. Though unmarried, she nevertheless loved her men--fiercely! As a respected artist in Baltimore and in Washington, Sarah can truly be considered America's first woman professional artist, her art work continuously being in demand during her days and now hanging on the walls of prominent American museums.

Organised chronologically and then by topic, this volume covers studies of women and health in the colonial and revolutionary periods through the Civil War. The remainder of the book focuses on the late 19th and 20th centuries.

This volume fills a gap in traditional women's history books by offering fascinating details of the lives of early American women and showing how these women adapted to the challenges of daily life in the colonies. Women in Early America: Struggle, Survival, and Freedom in a New World provides insight into an era in American history when women had immense responsibilities and unusual freedoms. These women worked in a range of occupations such as tavernkeeping, printing, spiritual leadership, trading, and shopkeeping. Pipe smoking, beer drinking, and premarital sex were widespread. One of every eight people traveling with the British Army during the American Revolution was a woman. The coverage begins with the 1607 settlement at Jamestown and ends with the War of 1812. In addition to the role of Anglo-American women, the experiences of African, French, Dutch, and Native American women are discussed. The issues discussed include how women coped with rural isolation, why they were prone to superstitions, who was likely to give birth out of wedlock, and how they raised large families while coping with immense household responsibilities.