Lydia Becker

24 February 1827 - 18 July 1890

Standard Name: Becker, Lydia

Birth Name: Lydia Ernestine Becker

Used Form: L. E. B.

LB first established herself in the mid nineteenth century as a popularizer of scientific knowledge and a proponent of women's scientific education. She is best known for her work on the Women's Suffrage Journal, the major organ of the suffrage movement in the 1870s and 1880s; she also contributed papers and essays to the cause through other outlets.

Full profile

Connections

Connections Sort descending	Author name	Excerpt
Education	Emmeline Pankhurst	EP 's parents encouraged her intellectual development from an early age. Among the important first texts she read were Bunyan 's Pilgrim's Progress and John BunyanHoly War, and Carlyle 's French Revolution. Her mother...
Occupation	Josephine Butler	JB threw herself into social work of all kinds, aiming to assist those less fortunate than herself. She began by visiting and examining oakum sheds, in which women, both prison inmates and creatures driven...
Occupation	Maude Royden	In 1915 she resigned from the society, which had its source in the merging in 1887 of seventeen organizations devoted to campaigning for women's emancipation. Lydia Becker , then Millicent Garrett Fawcett , had been...
politics	Helen Blackburn	Frances Balfour describes HB as the last of three early workers for the Suffrage, Miss Lydia Becker , and Miss Caroline Ashurst Biggs . Balfour, Frances. Ne obliviscaris. Hodder and Stoughton, 1930, 2 vols. II: 131
politics	Jessie Boucherett	JB 's associates in maintaining the original committee's name and agenda included Millicent Garrett Fawcett , Frances Power Cobbe , Lydia Becker , Helen Blackburn , and Caroline Ashurst Biggs . Levine, Philippa. Victorian Feminism 1850-1900. Hutchinson, 1987. 64, 66 Historian Philippa Levine
politics	Emily Davies	The Education Act of 1870 allowed for the election of women to School Boards; ED 's prominence as an education activist is evident in her election as only the second woman (following Elizabeth Garrett )...
politics	Millicent Garrett Fawcett	MGF was a member of the first Women's Suffrage Committee , formed in July 1867 after John Stuart Mill proposed his suffrage amendment in parliament. She was the youngest woman at the initial gathering. At...
politics	Emmeline Pankhurst	After her return to Manchester, EP joined the Lancashire and Cheshire Union of Women's Liberal Associations and organised a Free Trade Hall demonstration. She and her colleagues sought to secure voting privileges for married...
politics	Emmeline Pankhurst	The WSPU was militant, unlike the National Union of Women's Suffrage Societies , a federation of suffrage societies led by Lydia Becker and later by Millicent Garrett Fawcett . Pankhurst, Sylvia. The Life of Emmeline Pankhurst. Kraus Reprint, 1969. 50n1
Publishing	Helen Blackburn	HB 's other works on the suffrage movement and women's rights include A Handy Book of Reference for Irishwomen (1888) and Some Supporters of the Women's Suffrage Movement (published by the Central Committee of the National Society for Women's Suffrage
Textual Features	Millicent Garrett Fawcett	The microfilm collection is in two parts. Part 1 contains the papers of Lydia Becker and Margaret Ashton . Part 2 contains MGF 's papers, as well as sections on women's suffrage, education, employment, welfare...
Textual Production	Frances Power Cobbe	She remained attentive to the patterns of violence against women, particularly sexual crimes and domestic violence. Lydia Becker did not like to ask her to write gratis for the Women's Suffrage Journal, but seems...
Theme or Topic Treated in Text	Helen Blackburn	The second part of the book comprises biographical sketches of Lydia Becker , since, according to HB , her life above all others has left the impress of its intellectual force and deep sympathy with...
Wealth and Poverty	Helen Blackburn	HB bequeathed her library to Girton College , Cambridge, in memory of Lydia Becker and Caroline Ashurst Biggs . The collection was presented to the library in a mahogany bookcase which she designed herself...

Timeline

9 August 1870

The Education Act established a national elementary education system governed by local school boards, to which women could be elected.

Simon, Brian. Studies in the History of Education, 1780-1870. Lawrence and Wishart, 1960.

364-5

Purvis, June. A History of Women’s Education in England. Open University Press, 1991.

25-6

Levine, Philippa. Victorian Feminism 1850-1900. Hutchinson, 1987.

Norman, Edward R. The English Catholic Church in the Nineteenth Century. Clarendon, 1984.

159

Ward, Mary Augusta. A Writer’s Recollections. Harper and Brothers, 1918.

4, 35

1888

Two new groups emerged from the National Society for Women's Suffrage after internal dissension about permitting affiliations with other organisations: the Central Committee of the National Society for Women's Suffrage retained its existing name; the...

1886

Elizabeth Cady Stanton approached Priscilla Bright McLaren and Anna Maria Priestman to help organise a British delegation to an international conference of suffragists in Washington.

Holton, Sandra Stanley. Suffrage Days: Stories from the Women’s Suffrage Movement. Routledge, 1996.

Texts

Becker, Lydia. Botany for Novices. Whittaker, 1864, 60 pp.

Becker, Lydia. Liberty, Equality, Fraternity, a Reply to Mr. Fitzjames Stephen’s Strictures on Mr. J. S. Mill’s Subjection of Women. A. Ireland, 1874.

Becker, Lydia. The Political Disabilities of Women. A. Ireland, 1872.

Becker, Lydia. The Rights and Duties of Women in Local Government: A Paper. A. Ireland, 1879.

Becker, Lydia et al. Women’s Suffrage Collection from Manchester Central Library. Adam Matthew, 1994, 2 parts (15 microfilm reels each).

Becker, Lydia et al. Women’s Suffrage Collection from Manchester Central Library: A Listing and Guide to the Microfilm Collection. Adam Matthew, 1995.

Becker, Lydia, editor. Women’s Suffrage Journal. Trübner, 21 vols.

Becker, Lydia. Words of a Leader. Editor Blackburn, Helen, J. W. Arrowsmith, 1897.