cover image A Whole-Souled Woman: Prudence Crandall and the Education of Black Women

A Whole-Souled Woman: Prudence Crandall and the Education of Black Women

Susan Strane. W. W. Norton & Company, $19.95 (278pp) ISBN 978-0-393-02826-3

Prudence Crandall (1803-1890) secured her place in history when she enrolled a black girl in her boarding school in Canterbury, Conn. In the resulting controversy, Miss Crandall's Female Seminary became an all-black institution. Ultimately, however, the state's Black Law, under which Crandall was jailed and tried three times, and persisting persecution forced the school to close in 1834. The stubbornly righteous crusader migrated to Kansas, where civil rights and women's causes continued to engage her. The moral and spiritual climate that brought about the Civil War is made palpable in this engaging study--Strane's debut book--of a seminal freedom fighter. (May)