Lois Waisbrooker
Encyclopedia
Lois Waisbrooker was an American feminist
author, editor, publisher, and campaigner of the later nineteenth and the early twentieth centuries. She wrote extensively on issues of sex, marriage, birth control, and women's rights, plus related areas of radical thought like free speech, anarchism
, and spiritualism
. She is perhaps best remembered for her 1893
novel A Sex Revolution.
Born Adeline Eliza Nichols in upstate New York, she grew up in poverty there and in Ohio; she had little formal education, and worked for some years as a domestic servant. Beginning at the age of seventeen, an illegitimate pregnancy, a forced marriage, a quick widowhood and a brief second marriage inspired her devotion to feminist values. She converted to spiritualism and became a "trance speaker" at spiritualist gatherings. By 1863 she had adopted the name Lois Waisbrooker, and began a practice of lecturing and journalism that continued through the remainder of her life. "She wrote passable poetry, but didactic prose was her forte." She helped to organize the Boston Social Freedon Convention in the 1870s, and served as an official of the American Labor Reform League in 1882–83.
Waisbrooker founded and edited three periodicals, Our Age, Foundation Principles, and Clothed with the Sun (sometimes even setting the type and operating the printing press). In 1892 she "served as acting editor of an anarchist free-thought weekly titled Lucifer, the Light-Bearer" when its former editor Moses Harmon went to prison. Like other radical writers of the period, she was prosecuted under the Comstock Act that prohibited the sending of obscene materials through the U.S. mail. She was involved in public controversy, and was the subject of condemnation and ridicule, throughout her career. In August 1894, the Topeka State Journal
ran a story about her under the derisive headline "A Queer Old Woman Thinks She Has a Mission to Perform."
Waisbrooker spent a late phase of her career at the experimental community of Home, Washington
. She arrived there early in 1901; local residents built her a small house. While there, Waisbrooker became involved in another legal controversy. She and the local postmistress, Mattie D. Penhallow, were arrested and charged with disseminating obscene material — the material in question being an article in Clothed with the Sun titled "The Awful Fate of Fallen Women." A jury convicted Waisbrooker; a sympathetic judge sentenced her to the minimum penalty, a fine of $100. (Penhallow was acquitted, though the U.S. Post Office subsequently closed the Home post office.)
Waisbrooker continued her activities to the end of her life, despite advancing age and worsening health. She left Home for Denver in 1904, and died, "Antioch, California where she is buried along with son, Abner Fuller in Oak View Memorial Park," at the age of eighty-three. "Penniless at the time of her death in 1909, Lois Waisbrooker had spent over forty years promoting the twin ideas of assertive womanhood and female sexuality as a positive power."
Feminism
Feminism is a collection of movements aimed at defining, establishing, and defending equal political, economic, and social rights and equal opportunities for women. Its concepts overlap with those of women's rights...
author, editor, publisher, and campaigner of the later nineteenth and the early twentieth centuries. She wrote extensively on issues of sex, marriage, birth control, and women's rights, plus related areas of radical thought like free speech, anarchism
Anarchism
Anarchism is generally defined as the political philosophy which holds the state to be undesirable, unnecessary, and harmful, or alternatively as opposing authority in the conduct of human relations...
, and spiritualism
Spiritualism
Spiritualism is a belief system or religion, postulating the belief that spirits of the dead residing in the spirit world have both the ability and the inclination to communicate with the living...
. She is perhaps best remembered for her 1893
1893 in literature
The year 1893 in literature involved some significant new books.-Events:*André Gide begins his travels in North Africa.*Jerome K. Jerome founds the magazine To-Day.-New books:*Byron A...
novel A Sex Revolution.
Born Adeline Eliza Nichols in upstate New York, she grew up in poverty there and in Ohio; she had little formal education, and worked for some years as a domestic servant. Beginning at the age of seventeen, an illegitimate pregnancy, a forced marriage, a quick widowhood and a brief second marriage inspired her devotion to feminist values. She converted to spiritualism and became a "trance speaker" at spiritualist gatherings. By 1863 she had adopted the name Lois Waisbrooker, and began a practice of lecturing and journalism that continued through the remainder of her life. "She wrote passable poetry, but didactic prose was her forte." She helped to organize the Boston Social Freedon Convention in the 1870s, and served as an official of the American Labor Reform League in 1882–83.
Waisbrooker founded and edited three periodicals, Our Age, Foundation Principles, and Clothed with the Sun (sometimes even setting the type and operating the printing press). In 1892 she "served as acting editor of an anarchist free-thought weekly titled Lucifer, the Light-Bearer" when its former editor Moses Harmon went to prison. Like other radical writers of the period, she was prosecuted under the Comstock Act that prohibited the sending of obscene materials through the U.S. mail. She was involved in public controversy, and was the subject of condemnation and ridicule, throughout her career. In August 1894, the Topeka State Journal
The Topeka Capital-Journal
The Topeka Capital-Journal is a daily newspaper in Topeka, Kansas owned by Morris Communications. It has won one Pulitzer Prize.-History:...
ran a story about her under the derisive headline "A Queer Old Woman Thinks She Has a Mission to Perform."
Waisbrooker spent a late phase of her career at the experimental community of Home, Washington
Home, Washington
Home is an CDP in Pierce County, Washington, United States. The 2010 Census placed the population at 1,377. The community lies on the Key Peninsula and borders the waters of Carr Inlet, an extension of the Puget Sound...
. She arrived there early in 1901; local residents built her a small house. While there, Waisbrooker became involved in another legal controversy. She and the local postmistress, Mattie D. Penhallow, were arrested and charged with disseminating obscene material — the material in question being an article in Clothed with the Sun titled "The Awful Fate of Fallen Women." A jury convicted Waisbrooker; a sympathetic judge sentenced her to the minimum penalty, a fine of $100. (Penhallow was acquitted, though the U.S. Post Office subsequently closed the Home post office.)
Waisbrooker continued her activities to the end of her life, despite advancing age and worsening health. She left Home for Denver in 1904, and died, "Antioch, California where she is buried along with son, Abner Fuller in Oak View Memorial Park," at the age of eighty-three. "Penniless at the time of her death in 1909, Lois Waisbrooker had spent over forty years promoting the twin ideas of assertive womanhood and female sexuality as a positive power."
Selected works of Lois Waisbrooker
- Mayweed Blossoms (1871), novel
- The Sexual Question and the Money Power (1873)
- Nothing Like It, or Steps to the Kingdom (1875), novel
- From Generation to Regeneration (1879)
- Perfect Motherhood; or Mabel Raymond's Resolve (1890), novel
- The Fountain of Life; or The Threefold Power of Sex (1893)
- The Occult Forces of Sex (1893)
- A Sex Revolution (1893), novel
- The Wherefore Investigating Company (1894), novel
- Anything More, My Lord? (1895)
- The Temperance Folly; or Who's the Worst? (1900)
- My Century Plant (1903)
- Women's Sense of Power (1903)
- Eugenics; or Race Culture Lessons (1907)