North Carolina Women: Making History
by Margaret Supplee Smith and Emily Herring Wilson
Foreword by Doris Betts

Revealing the influence of women in shaping the state's character and economy, this heavily illustrated narrative history tells the story of Tar Heel women from prehistory through World War II.

Did you know?

  • Native American women lived in a culture in which they were the farmers; kinship and property were traced through the female line; and men and women played different but equally important roles.

  • Seventeen women were among the settlers of the Lost Colony.

  • On the North Carolina frontier in the Albemarle, men and women shared the same hardships and responsibilities, and the scarcity of people and the struggle to survive meant that gender and race did not always determine who did what.

  • Between 1830 and 1840, women became a majority of North Carolinians.

  • There were more women than men between 1830 and 1840 and women's domestic, agricultural, and industrial labor undergirded North Carolina's antebellum economy.

  • During the Civil War, women's "proper place" was challenged by their visible actions on the homefront, on the battlefield, and in new occupations.

  • In 1920, more women were employed in textiles and tobacco in North Carolina than in any other southern state.

  • As the "lady manager" of North Carolina's exhibit at the 1893 Chicago World's Fair, Sallie Southall Cotten was inspired to return home and organize the white middle-class women in a federation of women's clubs.

  • By the end of the twentieth century, women made up about half of the state's workforce.

Find out more about these and other interesting facts in North Carolina Women: Making History.

Advance Praise for North Carolina Women

"Stunning in scope, elegantly presented, and meticulously researched, North Carolina Women fills a huge void in our understanding of the role of women in the Tar Heel state. Not only is this essential reading for scholars, but the volume should appeal to anyone interested in North Carolina, southern, and women's history."--Alan D. Watson, University of North Carolina at Wilmington

"This is a book for all North Carolinians of whatever race, age or sex. Every book club in the state should undertake it as a project. It does more than add a dimension to North Carolina history: it significantly reorders the past."--Anne Firor Scott, Duke University

"Makes clear to men as well as women the mutual benefit of knowing the whole story that generations of Tar Heels have shared. To have in schools, libraries, and homes this readable and carefully researched history is a joyful circumstance for all readers, who will realize anew how much better our shared future becomes when we learn from the shared past."--Doris Betts, from the Foreword


Other related information from UNC Press:
Find other books in women's studies
Gender and American Culture Series
Light and Air: The Photography of Bayard Wootten

The University of North Carolina Press

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