Giving Thanks! And Sarah Josepha Hale

 Wendy Kendall:  I have so very much to be grateful for. Part of my joy is that I'm eternally thankful for all my readers. I love hearing from you all who tell me how much you've enjoyed Kat Out of the Bag and also the recently released prequel Purse-Stachio Makes A Splash, which also appears in the anthology A Taste of Danger with two fellow The Wild Rose Press authors' wonderful stories - Julie Howard and Peggy Chambers

I had so much fun writing these stories! And more are on the way!

Thank You for enjoying my books and blog. Wishing you a Happy Holiday Thanksgiving!

Here's the story of the extraordinary woman behind the push for a National Thanksgiving Holiday, and a special purse of her time . . . .

Sarah Josepha Hale

She was widowed in 1822, single parenting 5 children. Her many accomplishments including publishing poetry, a novel, and a second book of poetry that included the familiar - Mary Had a Little Lamb .

By 1828 she became the first American woman editor of a magazine - Boston's Ladies' Magazine. By 1837 she merged her magazine with another creating the most popular fashion magazine of the 19th century - Godey's Lady's Book.

The magazine was famous for its drawings of women dressed in the newest fashions. Those illustrations were produced by engraving a sheet of flat metal called a "plate" in the shape of that woman model. That flat metal sheet the image was reprinted into the pages of the magazines. The images were then meticulously colored by hand. In the past, have you ever heard of a woman referred to as a fashion plate? This process is the origin of that saying.

Sarah Josepha Hale also campaigned President Lincoln persistently to establish Thanksgiving as a national holiday. She pitched the idea as something that would bring the country divided by the civil war back together again. Lincoln issued the proclamation in 1863.

Here's text from a page right out of her own magazine, showing the fashionable Marguerite Pouch, an oval shaped purse and a style which is still sold today:

Our pattern is in dark blue velvet, lined with white silk. The ornaments, the lock and chain, are in steel. The velvet may be worked with a pattern in braiding or beads, the stars with steel beads, the steel hanging ornaments replaced by tassels made with steel beads, and the chain by blue velvet ribbon now so much in vogue. They make a pretty finish to a linsey dress.

Thank you to Pinterest for this photo: https://www.pinterest.cl/pin/4362930877188813/