Alice Hamilton

Barbara Sicherman

Published by Harvard University Press 1984

Alice Hamilton

A Life in Letters

Barbara Sicherman

Volume 42 in the series Commonwealth Fund Publications

https://doi.org/10.4159/harvard.9780674424166

Overview
Contents

About this book

She was first considered "subversive" during World War I, yet she lived to protest our involvement in Vietnam. She was America's foremost industrial toxicologist, a pioneer in medicine and in social reform, long-time resident of Hull House, pacifist and civil libertarian. She was Edith Hamilton's sister, and the first woman on the faculty of Harvard, though she retired--an assistant professor in the school of public health--ten years before women medical students were admitted.

This legendary figure now comes to life in an integrated work of biography and letters. A keen observer and an extraordinarily complex woman, Alice Hamilton left a rich correspondence, spanning the period from 1888 to 1965, that forms a journal of her times as well as of her life. The letters document the range of her involvement, from the battle against lead poisoning to debates with Felix Frankfurter over civil liberties. But as Alice Hamilton describes a woman's medical education in the late nineteenth century, her unlikely adventures in city slums, mine shafts, and factories, her work with Jane Addams and the women's peace movement, we also witness the stages of one woman's evolution from self-deprecating girl to leading social advocate. The charming details of her girlhood help us to understand her conflicted need to escape Victorian constraints without violating her own notion of femininity, a dilemma resolved only by a career combining science with service.

Beautifully realized works themselves, these letters have been woven by Barbara Sicherman into an exemplary biography that opens a window on the Progressive era.

Author information

SichermanBarbara:

Barbara Sicherman is Kenan Professor of American Institutions and Values, Trinity College, and coeditor of Notable American Women: The Modern Period.

Reviews

One of the most fulfilling books about the life and work of a physician that I have read in many a year... A beautiful piece of scholarship and a book that is a pleasure to read and to think about.

In our age without heroes, it is both refreshing and valuable to be reminded of heroic lives. Alice Hamilton was such a person. Her rich and varied life, her fortitude and accomplishments, are brought to light in this deeply affecting, beautifully constructed biography.

A book which captures and illuminates Hamilton's many-faceted personality and career. It allows us to become acquainted with a complex and changing individual while placing her thoughts and activities within the context of late 19th-century feminist thought... We come away from Alice Hamilton with an enriched sense of the personal and social dilemmas her generation of educated women reformers sought to resolve.

Elegant and illuminating... A book to be read and reread, and pondered for all that it can teach.

Brings to life a remarkable woman ... Alice Hamilton, pioneer in industrial medicine and, so to speak, the grandmother of the Occupational Health and Safety Administration, was one of that extraordinary first flight of activist women who set about changing the world... A memorable portrait of a woman and an age.

Topics

Frontmatter Publicly Available Download PDF	i
PREFACE Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	vii
CONTENTS Publicly Available Download PDF	xi
ILLUSTRATIONS Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	xiii
INTRODUCTION Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	1
I. THE HAMILTONS OF FORT WAYNE Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	11
II. MEDICAL TRAINING 1890–1894 Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	33
III. “I SHALL KNOW, BEING OLD”: CAREER AND FAMILY 1895–1897 Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	88
IV. HULL HOUSE 1897–1907 Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	111
V. EXPLORING THE DANGEROUS TRADES 1908–1914 Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	153
VI. THE WAR YEARS 1915–1919 Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	184
VII. THE HARVARD YEARS 1919–1927 Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	237
VIII. ELDER STATESWOMAN 1928–1935 Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	311
IX. SEMI-RETIREMENT 1935–1949 Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	356
X. “OLD-OLD AGE”1950–1970 Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	380
Abbreviations Notes Sources Acknowledgments Index Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	417
ABBREVIATIONS Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	418
NOTES Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	419
SOURCES Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	441
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	448
INDEX Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	451

(Deutsch)

Language: English
Publisher: Harvard University Press
Edition: Reprint 2014
Audience: Professional and scholarly;
Pages
- Front matter: 14
- Main content: 460
Illustrations
- Illustrations: 11
- Other: illustrations
Keywords: Physicians -- United States -- Biography.; Toxicologists -- United States -- Biography.; SCIENCE / History; BIOGRAPHY & AUTOBIOGRAPHY / Women; Hamilton, Alice, 1869-1970.

eBook

Published: October 1, 2013
ISBN: 9780674424166

Hardcover

Published: February 5, 1984
ISBN: 9780674424159