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During the early portion of the 19th Century painting, especially with water colors, was a popular past time among women. With the advent of the Industrial Revolution in America, a burgeoning Middle Class was emerging and women found themselves with more leisure time due to developments in home appliances and the resources to employ a domestic servant. Along with this, new inventions of farming equipment made the chores of the rural farmer easier and less time consuming and women found more increasingly they were no longer needed to assist in the fields. Women instead aspired to become ladies of leisure or ladies of the house, becoming isolated and enshrining themselves in their homes their. One perfectly acceptable past time for these women was that of painting.

It was even written as early at the 17th Century ladies of leisure were encouraged to paint. One anonymous late 18th Century reviewer even wrote “It demands no sacrifice of maiden modesty nor of matronly reserve; . . . it does not force her to stand up to be stared at, commented on, clapped or hissed by a crowded and unmannered audience, who forget the woman in the artist. It leaves her, during a great portion of her time at least, beneath the protecting shelter of her home, beside her own quiet fireside, in the midst of those who love her and whom she loves.”