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Title: The Midwife's Tale: An Oral History from Handywoman to Professional Midwife by Nicky Leap, Billie Hunter ISBN: 1-85727-036-3 Publisher: Scarlet Pr Pub. Date: August, 1993 Format: Hardcover Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $55.95

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Average Customer Rating: 5 (1 review)

Rating: 5
Summary: Midwives as Key to Understanding early American Life
Comment: Laurel Thatcher Ulrich's incredible book, A Midwife's Tale: The Life of Martha Ballard Based on Her Diary 1785-1812 is an amazingly comprehensive collection of facts and details that give life to the seemingly mundane diary entries of an 18th century American midwife. A Midwife's Tale is not only what the title implies...the story of a midwife. Rather, it is equally a history lesson on New England medicine, religion, politics, accounting, gender roles and social structure. In the midst of all this, however, it's not easy to escape the fact that the author of this history is a 20th Century female, and thus she bestows upon Martha Ballard a kind of feminist heroicism that, in 18th Century Hallowell would simply be a solid wife's duty. Through A Midwife's Tale one is given a glimpse of how aspects of daily life in 18th Century New England were created and what brought about their changes. We see Martha Ballard as a relatively traditional midwife during the advent of many new medical practices. Through her midwife practice, we also begin to understand the distinct roles of men and women in medicine, as well as in daily life. Men were doctors, women midwives. Men traveled and conducted business, women remained at home. Gender roles also help us understand further the role community played in 18th Century New England. Without the help of her varied female neighbors, Martha Ballard's practice would be even more exhausting than it seems it already was. Even more importantly, without the complex network of the extended family and at-home weaving, Martha Ballard would not have been able to go out to perform her duties as a midwife. All of these aspects of life intertwined and paid off, as is seen in Martha Ballard's accounting notes. Laurel Thatcher Ulrich sums it up on page 80: "By expanding textile production, Martha provided household help for herself and an occupation for her girls." Martha Ballard's diary is also a reflection of changing religious attitudes, as is seen in the case of the wife of minister Isaac Foster who charged rape against Judge Joseph North. Isaac Foster seemed too progressive for some of the more conservative parishioners of Hallowell. As closely as religion and politics were tied back then, the case against Joseph North is also a window into New England law. From here, Martha Ballard also takes us into the politics of illegitimacy and marriage laws with the accusation brought against her own son that he was the father of an illegitimate child. While A Midwife's Tale: The Life of Martha Ballard Based on Her Diary 1785-1812 is an excellent, if not the foremost resource for 18th Century New England medical, social, cultural, religious, and political historians, it is also obviously a product of Laurel Thatcher Ulrich's contemporary values. While I was reading A Midwife's Tale, I couldn't help but feel Ulrich was really trying to drive home the point that Martha Ballard was an exceptional woman, even though Ulrich herself says Ballard was just an example of what average women were like at the time. But in describing Martha Ballard's work, Ulrich employs a kind of "presentism" in making Ballard into a feminist so obviously in control of her own business, social circle and religious beliefs. When writing about Martha Ballard, Ulrich uses language like "she was bound to serve anyone who needed her," (97) adjectives such as "benevolent," "charitable," and, in the introduction, describes a journey of Martha's as "She dragged herself out, mounted a neighbor's horse, and rode dripping to the delivery." (4) Phrases such as these are obviously meant to elevate Martha Ballard to a level that, if asked herself, Ballard would have said was merely expected of her. It seems to me that at the time Martha Ballard was an example of what a midwife to the middle to elite classes of 18th Century was like, and nothing more. With the advent of social historians in the 20th Century and with the greater freedoms women have today it is easy to marvel at how hard women in the past worked. There is no doubt that Martha Ballard was hard-working, and in the sense that it is used to teach us about the work of 18th Century American midwives, A Midwife's Tale: The Life of Martha Ballard Based on Her Diary 1785-1812 is priceless. However, it is also important to stress the fact that other than performing hard work, Martha Ballard's options were limited.