Annie Polland, "Midwives, Cooks, Palmists, and Housewives: Jewish Immigrant Women in the Tenements"

In-person and on Zoom. Register for Zoom at https://bit.ly/4gm1bpT
In the 1900 manuscript census, husbands/fathers, teenage sons, and daughters are listed with occupations: tailors, butchers, peddlers, clerks, sewing machine operators. The majority of mothers/wives enumerated, however, have a blank in the occupation column. This lecture explores how women's crucial economic and cultural roles are brought to life at the Tenement Museum, and draws on memoirs, cookbooks, midwife ledgers, advertisements, and newspaper accounts to discuss forgotten women of valor who deserve to be remembered.
Dr. Annie Polland is a public historian, author, and President of the Lower East Side Tenement Museum in New York City.
The Faye Sigman "Woman of Valor" Lecture is made possible by the generosity of the Taxman and Temkin families.
Cosponsored by Jewish Museum Milwaukee and UWM's Departments of Anthropology, History, and Women's and Gender Studies; and Urban Studies and Museum Studies programs.