Women in the 19C United States of America: Itinerant Artist Joseph Goodhue Chandler (1813-1884)

Saturday, December 19, 2020

Itinerant Artist Joseph Goodhue Chandler (1813-1884)

Joseph Goodhue Chandler (American artist, 1813 – 1884) Melinda Prouty Lamson-with son Nathaniel

An itinerant painter born in Massachusetts, Joseph Chandler was a typical 19th-century American folk artist traveling from place to place painting portraits. To the relief of modern-day curators, he signed & dated his paintings on the backs of the canvases. His portraits of children capture the awkwardness of his sitters, and he often included toys & pets & perhaps a landscape in the background--something he did not do with his adult sitters.

Joseph Goodhue Chandler (American artist, 1813 – 1884) Boy and Girl in Rose Garden

Joseph Goodhue Chandler (American artist, 1813 – 1884) Mary Elizabeth Bennet

Joseph Goodhue Chandler (American artist, 1813 – 1884) Whiting and Joseph Griswold

Joseph Goodhue Chandler (American artist, 1813 – 1884) Frederick Eugene Bennet

Joseph Goodhue Chandler (American artist, 1813 – 1884) Sylvia Parsons of Conway, Massachusetts

Joseph Goodhue Chandler (American artist, 1813 – 1884) Drummer Boy

Joseph Goodhue Chandler (American artist, 1813 – 1884) Girl with Kitten

Joseph Goodhue Chandler (American artist, 1813 – 1884) Mrs Annis S Griffen

Joseph Goodhue Chandler (American artist, 1813 – 1884) Boy and his Dog

Joseph Goodhue Chandler (American artist, 1813 – 1884) Annis Griffen

Joseph Goodhue Chandler (American artist, 1813 – 1884) Harriet M Kendall 1845

Joseph Goodhue Chandler (American artist, 1813 – 1884) Charles H Sisson

Joseph Goodhue Chandler (American artist, 1813 – 1884) Small Boy with Dog

About this blog

In colonial America, men were considered superior to woman in all ways. In a strict patriarchal hierarchy, men controlled not only wealth & political power but also how their children were raised, religious questions, & all matters of right & wrong.

In the early part of the 19Cy, however, many Americans experienced a revolution in gender. The doctrine of “separate spheres” maintained that woman’s sphere was the world of privacy, family, & morality while man’s sphere was the public world -– economic striving, political maneuvering, & social competition. But women were interested in equality.

In 1848, New York passed the Married Woman’s Property Act. Now a woman wasn’t automatically liable for her husband’s debts; she could enter contracts on her own; she could collect rents or receive an inheritance in her own right; she could file a lawsuit on her own behalf. She became for economic purposes, an individual. By 1900, every state has passed legislation modeled after this, granting married women some control over their property and earnings.

In 1870 after the Civi War, the 15th Amendment was ratified, saying, “The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude.” African-Americans could vote, but women could not.

But it was not until 1920, that the 19th Amendment was ratified granting women the right to vote. “The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex.”