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==Archives==
==Archives==
The archives of Lydia Becker are held at [[The Women's Library]] at [[London Metropolitan University]], ref [http://calmarchive.londonmet.ac.uk/DServe/dserve.exe?dsqIni=Dserve.ini&dsqApp=Archive&dsqDb=Catalog&dsqCmd=Overview.tcl&dsqSearch=(RefNo='7LEB') 7LEB]
The archives of Lydia Becker are held at [[The Women's Library]] at the [http://www.lse.ac.uk/library/Home.aspx Library of the London School of Economics], ref [http://twl-calm.library.lse.ac.uk/CalmView/dserve.exe?dsqIni=Dserve.ini&dsqApp=Archive&dsqDb=Catalog&dsqCmd=Overview.tcl&dsqSearch=(RefNo='7LEB') 7LEB]


==Notes==
==Notes==

Revision as of 10:37, 16 July 2013

Lydia Becker
Lydia Becker
Born24 February 1827
Chadderton, Lancashire
Died18 July 1890 (aged 63)
Aix-les-Bains
Cause of deathDiphtheria
NationalityBritish
Educationat home

Lydia Ernestine Becker (24 February 1827 – 18 July 1890) was a leader in the early British suffrage movement, as well as an amateur scientist with interests in biology and astronomy. She is best remembered for founding and publishing the Women's Suffrage Journal between 1870 and 1890.

Biography

Born in Chadderton, Lancashire, the eldest daughter of Hannibal Leigh Becker, whose father, Ernst Becker, emigrated from Ohrdruf, Thuringia. Lydia Becker was educated at home, like many girls at the time. Intellectually curious, she studied botany and astronomy, winning a gold medal for an 1862 scholarly paper on horticulture.[1] Five years later, she founded the Ladies' Literary Society in Manchester; she began a correspondence with Charles Darwin and soon afterwards and convinced him to send a paper to the society.[2][3][4] In the course of their correspondence, Becker sent a number of plant samples to Darwin from the fields surrounding Manchester.[5] She also forwarded Darwin a copy of her "little book", Botany for Novices (1864).[6] Becker is just one of a number of nineteenth-century women who contributed, often routinely, to Darwin's scientific work.[7] Her correspondence and work alike suggest that Becker had a particular interest in bisexual and hermaphroditic plants which, perhaps, offered her powerful 'natural' evidence of radical, alternative sexual and social order.[8]

In the autumn of 1866 Becker attended the annual meeting of the National Association for the Advancement of Social Science, where she was excited by a paper from Barbara Bodichon entitled "Reasons for the Enfranchisement of Women". She dedicated herself to organizing around the issue, and in January 1867 convened the first meeting of the Manchester Women's Suffrage Committee. It was the first organization of its kind in England.[9]

Several months later, a widow shop owner named Lily Maxwell mistakenly appeared on the register of voters in Manchester; Becker visited Maxwell and escorted her to the polling station. Once they arrived, the Returning Officer found Maxwell's name on the list and allowed her to vote. Becker immediately began encouraging other women heads of households in the region to petition for their names to appear on the rolls. Their claims were presented in court by junior defence barrister Richard Pankhurst in Chorlton v. Lings, but the case was rapidly dismissed.[10]

On 14 April 1868, Becker moved the resolution that women should be granted voting rights on the same terms as men at the first public meeting of the National Society for Women's Suffrage in Manchester Free Trade Hall. Becker subsequently commenced a lecture tour of Northern cities on behalf of the Society. In June 1869, Becker and fellow campaigners were successful in securing the vote for women in municipal elections. The following year women gained the right to vote and stand for election in the School Boards in England and Wales. Becker successfully stood for and was elected to the Manchester School Board. [11]

In 1870 Becker and her friend Jessie Boucherett founded the Women's Suffrage Journal. Soon afterward, they began organising speaking tours of women – a rarity in Britain at the time.[12] At an 1874 speaking event in Manchester organized by Becker, fifteen-year-old Emmeline Pankhurst experienced her first public gathering in the name of women's suffrage.[13]

The Journal was the most popular publication relating to women's suffrage in nineteenth-century Britain. Roger Fulford, in his study of the movement Votes for Women: The Story of a Struggle, writes: "The history of the decades from 1860 to 1890 – so far as women's suffrage is concerned – is the history of Miss Becker."[14] The Journal published speeches from around the country, both within and outside of Parliament. Becker published her correspondence with her supporters and her opponents, notably in 1870, when she chastised the MP for Caernarvonshire after he voted against a proposal offering women the vote.[15]

In 1880, Becker and co-workers campaigned in the Isle of Man for the right of women to vote in the House of Keys elections. Unexpectedly, they were successful and, ironically, they secured for women voting rights in the Isle of Man for the first time in the elections of March 1881.[16]

Becker differed from many early feminists in her disputation of essentialized femininity. Arguing that there was no natural difference between the intellect of men and women, Becker was a vocal advocate of a non-gendered education system in Britain.[17] She also differed with many suffrage activists in arguing more strenuously for the voting rights of unmarried women. Those women connected to husbands and stable sources of income, Becker believed, were less desperately in need of the vote than widows and single women. This attitude made her the target of frequent ridicule in newspaper commentary and editorial cartoons.[18]

In 1890 Becker visited the spa town of Aix-les-Bains, where she fell ill and died, aged 63.[17] Rather than continue publishing in her absence, the staff of the Women's Suffrage Journal decided to cease production.

Works

  • Botany for Novices (1864)
  • "Female Suffrage" in The Contemporary Review (1867)
  • "Is there any Specific Distinction between Male and Female Intellect?" in Englishwoman's Review of Social and Industrial Questions (1868)
  • "On the Study of Science by Women" in The Contemporary Review (1869)
  • "The Political Disabilities of Women" in The Westminster Review (1872)

Archives

The archives of Lydia Becker are held at The Women's Library at the Library of the London School of Economics, ref 7LEB

Notes

  1. ^ Holton, p. 22.
  2. ^ Attention: This template ({{cite doi}}) is deprecated. To cite the publication identified by doi:10.1080/17496970902981686, please use {{cite journal}} (if it was published in a bona fide academic journal, otherwise {{cite report}} with |doi=10.1080/17496970902981686 instead.
  3. ^ http://www.darwinproject.ac.uk/entry-5327
  4. ^ http://www.darwinproject.ac.uk/entry-4189
  5. ^ http://www.darwinproject.ac.uk/entry-4170
  6. ^ http://www.darwinproject.ac.uk/entry-4441
  7. ^ 'Women and Science' section of the 'Darwin & Gender' resources of the Darwin Correspondence Project
  8. ^ Bernstein, S. D., ‘‘Supposed Differences’: Lydia Becker and Victorian Women’s Participation in the BAAS’ in Clifford, D., Wadge, E., Warwick, A., & Willis, M. (eds.), Repositioning Victorian Society: Shifting Centres in Nineteenth-Century Scientific Thinking (London, 2006).
  9. ^ Liddington and Norris, p. 70; Fulford, pp. 54–55.
  10. ^ Liddington and Norris, p. 71; Phillips, p. 103; Fulford, pp. 63–64.
  11. ^ Herbet, pp 37-38
  12. ^ Phillips, p. 132.
  13. ^ Bartley, Paula. Emmeline Pankhurst. London: Routledge, 2002. ISBN 0-415-20651-0. p. 22.
  14. ^ Fulford, p. 78.
  15. ^ Fulford, pp. 77–78.
  16. ^ Herbet, P39.
  17. ^ a b "Lydia Becker – The Life and Times". Famous Chaddertonians. Chadderton Historical Society. 25 May 2008. Accessed on 6 August 2008.
  18. ^ Liddington and Norris, p. 74.

References

  • Fulford, Roger. Votes for Women: The Story of a Struggle. London: Faber and Faber Ltd, 1957. OCLC 191255.
  • Holton, Sandra Stanley. Suffrage Days: Stories from the Women's Suffrage Movement. London: Routledge, 1996. ISBN 0-415-10942-6.
  • Liddington, Jill and Jill Norris. One Hand Tied Behind Us: The Rise of the Women's Suffrage Movement. London: Virago Limited, 1978. ISBN 0-86068-007-X.
  • Phillips, Melanie. The Ascent of Woman: A History of the Suffragette Movement and the Ideas Behind It. London: Abacus, 2004. ISBN 0-349-11660-1.
  • Herbet, Michael. Up Then Brave Women: Manchester's Radical Women 1819 - 1918. North West Labour History Society, 2012. ISBN 978-0-9523410-1-7

External links

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