Documenting “Herstories” in the Ohio Valley at The Filson

70 OHIO VALLEY HISTORY Collection Essay Documenting “Herstories” in the OhioValley at The Filson T he influence of women on the history of Kentucky and the Ohio Valley cannot be over-estimated. Women’s actions have impacted virtually every aspect of life in the region, including politics, education, social activities, war, the domestic sphere and courtship, religion and morality, and the arts. As part of its mission to collect, preserve, and share the stories of Kentucky and the Ohio Valley, The Filson holds many collections that document women’s contributions to the region’s history, their struggles and triumphs, and the contours of their daily lives, including interactions with family, peers, neighbors, and business associates. What follows, then, is a brief description of a few collections researchers interested in the history of women in the Ohio Valley may find useful. Those seeking a broad picture of women’s daily lives over a significant period of time will find several unique resources at The Filson, including the Corlis-Respess Family Papers, the Blackburn Family Papers, and the Bullitt-Chenoweth Family Papers. Julia Ann Tevis (1799-1880) and the Science Hill class of 1860. THE FILSON HISTORICAL SOCIETY ERIC WILLEY SUMMER 2013 71 The Corlis-Respess Family Papers feature eighty folders of correspondence created by three generations of women discussing daily life, farming, medicine, religion , land, children, family, education, and business. Mary Ann Corlis described both her experience as a newcomer to Kentucky in 1815 and raising her children as a widow. Letters from Elizabeth and Harriet Corlis depict their experiences in school in the 1820s, and later letters from Harriet explain how she managed the Corlis farm in Bourbon County, Kentucky, after her father’s death in 1839. Correspondence from Susan C. R. Respess offers researchers insight into her time as a student at the Science Hill Female Academy in Shelbyville, Kentucky, in the 1850s. Harriet (Corlis) Meacham left a wealth of correspondence from the 1840s through the 1860s that discusses daily life, children, and family matters. Additional correspondence from other female descendants of the Corlis and Respess families paint a rich view of women’s lives in Kentucky over a significant time period.1 The Blackburn Family Papers offer a similar resource for the years 1840 to 1896. These papers contain a wide range of letters from women who discuss their concerns, duties, social and economic views, health, and family life. In February 1857, for example, Henrietta Blackburn described her life as a widow with two children, living with her mother: I try to accommodate Ma & assist her in every way I can, though I’ve been less than usual this winter for the baby is a great care to me particularly at night & I’ve not been well for months. I would not give up Mary though she were ten times the care. Poor Mary could feel no anxiety about her little orphan to know how tenderly I cherish her & how fond of me, she is. Cure for fever and ague, family recipe from Corlis-Respess Papers. THE FILSON HISTORICAL SOCIETY DOCUMENTING “HERSTORIES” IN THE OHIO VALLEY AT THE FILSON 72 OHIO VALLEY HISTORY While the Blackburn Family papers do not cover a span of time as broad as some other collections, they nevertheless offer a fascinating window into the lives of women in the second half of the nineteenth century.2 The Bullitt-Chenoweth Family Papers contain correspondence from 1786 to 1930, primarily between the women of the Bullitt, Chenoweth, and Fry families, and their friends. The letters depict women’s roles and lives at the Oxmoor family estate while William C. Bullitt, his wife Mildred Ann Fry Bullitt, and their children lived there. They also offer glimpses of life at nineteenth-century frontier army posts in Alabama, Mississippi, and Minnesota territories. In a November 1851 letter, Susan Bullitt Dixon wrote: My journey to Cumberland was as sluggish, uneventful, and melancholy as the winding of a brook through a sandy plain, or ‘the Desert of Sahara.’ An old woman was fascinated by my bonnet and after gaping at me for an hour, as a prelude to acquaintance asked me the time of day (what an insight into human nature that...