Caroline Healey Dall

Caroline Wells Dall ( Healey; June 22, 1822 – December 17, 1912) was an American feminist writer, transcendentalist, and reformer. She was affiliated with the National Women's Rights Convention, the New England Women's Club, and the American Social Science Association. Her associates included Elizabeth Peabody and Margaret Fuller, as well as members of the Transcendentalist movement in Boston.

Biography

Early life and education Caroline Wells Healey was born and raised in Boston, Massachusetts, daughter of Mark Healey, a merchant and investor, and his wife, Caroline ( Foster) Healey. She lived there off and on during her life. As a young woman, she received a comprehensive education, encouraged by her father to write novels and essays, and to engage in debates about religion, philosophy and politics. Over Christmas 1842, a Unitarian minister from Baltimore, Charles Henry Appleton Dall, came to fill an open pulpit in Georgetown. Healey initially found Dall unappealing and she was shocked when he proposed to her by letter months later. But after a few weeks of correspondence, she accepted his proposal, resigned her teaching position, and moved to Baltimore. Also with Davis, she founded Una, a journal devoted to woman's rights, and the pioneer publication of its kind.

After deciding that she did not like working with groups, Dall turned to writing as her principal means of addressing women's equality. her most prominent works from this time included Historical Pictures Retouched: a Volume of Miscellanies (1861), which highlighted previously ignored women in history, and a collection of lectures entitled The College, the Market, and the Court; or Woman's Relation to Education, Labor, and Law (1867) in which she argued that the modern woman was no longer content to be in the domestic sphere and should be allowed to participate in public life.

Later life

In the late 1860s, Dall retired from the Women's Rights movement and turned her writing attention to such diverse topics as Egypt (Egypt's Place in History 1868) and the Civil War (Patty Gray's Journey, three volumes for children, 1869–70). During this time, she also moved to Washington, D.C., where she became a friend of the current first lady Frances Cleveland. In the last years of her life, she suffered greatly from arthritis, though she remained active until her death at the age of 90 on December 17, 1912.

Works

The College, the Market, and the Court: or, Woman's Relation to Education, Labor, and Law. Boston: Rumford Pres, 1914. The Life of Dr. Anandabai Joshee: A Kinswoman of the Pundita Ramabai. Boston: Roberts Brothers, 1888.

Selected Journals of Caroline Healey Dall. Helen R. Deese (ed.) Volume 1: 1838–1855. Boston: Massachusetts Historical Society, 2006. Volume 2: 1855–1866. Boston: Massachusetts Historical Society, 2013.