Four of America’s Many Fascinating Women
American Daughters, by Piper Huguley, is based on the real life friendship of Portia Washington and Alice Roosevelt. Alice Roosevelt, of course, was the daughter of Teddy Roosevelt. Booker T. Washington was Portia’s father. While the two women were different in their aspirations and social status, they shared a desire to support their famous fathers. Through their letters to one another, the author reveals both womens’ personalities and the importance of their friendship.
Fast forward to the administration of another President Roosevelt and read about Frances Perkins, the first women to hold a cabinet position in the United States government. Franklin Roosevelt named Perkins as Secretary of Labor, a position she held for twelve years. Her most noted accomplishment was the creation of the Social Security Act in 1935, however, she has never been given the recognition she deserves. Stephanie Dray seeks to remedy that situation in her historical novel Becoming Madam Secretary.
If you have stayed in Boston long enough to take a nice tour of the city, you have probably gone to the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum. In 1903, Gardner opened her museum in a building modeled after an Italian palace. It showcased an incredible art collection that Gardner and her husband had collected from years of traveling the world. Glaringly absent on the walls today are 13 works of art, worth at least half a billion dollars, that were stolen in broad daylight by a group of thieves disguised as Boston police officers. This art heist remains one of the greatest unsolved mysteries of modern times.
Just as interesting, however, is the life of Isabella Steward Gardner. Natalie Dykstra’s Chasing Beauty: The Life of Isabella Stewart Gardner, tells how Gardner suffered the death of her only child and cruel misundertanding by Boston elite to collect a massive treasure trove of art work. After her husband’s death, she single handedly designed a space worthy of her collection, and she placed each piece of art to reflect her relationship to it. I would love to read the book and go back to the museum. This time, the experience would be even more powerful than before.
Isabella Stewart Gardner, Chasing Beauty by Natalie Dykstra