About the Author
Tina Stewart Brakebill is an award winning author and teacher. As an instructor at Illinois State University, Brakebill's classes focus on the experiences of women and minorities. She recently won the highest honor bestowed on teachers: the Outstanding University Teaching Award. Similar to her pedagogical goals, her research and writing also aims to give voice to the previously unheard. Her first book “Circumstances are destiny”: An Antebellum Woman's Struggle to Define Sphere explores the way in which the life of one “ordinary” woman can broaden and deepen our understanding of historical themes and trends. It tells the story of an Ohio wife, mother, and rural dairy farmer as she attempted to incorporate the roles of writer, abolitionist, and women's rights advocate into her life. It received the William and Henry Harrison Award for the best book for an Ohio related family history.
Series Editor Carol Berkin is a well-known women's historian and the author of many popular and scholarly books, including Civil War Wives. She is Professor of History Emerita at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York, and she is a member of the Society of American Historians.
