Press

ALBANY, NY – Timothy Kenslea, author of The Sedgwicks in Love: Courtship, Engagement, and Marriage in the Early Republic, will read from his book and discuss his research into changes in courtship and marriage in the early 19th century on July 6th at 7 p.m. at the New York State Museum Theater.

The Sedgwicks in Love is a narrative exploration of the evolving relationship between men and women in the generation born just after the American Revolution. The book focuses on seven brothers and sisters of one prominent family – the Sedgwicks of Massachusetts -- with members living in the Berkshires, Albany, New York City, and Boston.

These Sedgwick brothers and sisters wrote everything down, making it possible for Kenslea to tell their stories in a nonfiction narrative that has continuing characters, a plot, and even occasional passages of dialogue, quoted and cited from Sedgwick family papers archived at the Massachusetts Historical Society in Boston.

Kenslea, a history teacher at Norwell High School in Norwell, Massachusetts, is on leave this year to promote The Sedgwicks in Love. The book was published in January by Northeastern University Press, a member press of the University Press of New England consortium, based in Hanover, New Hampshire. Since last fall, Kenslea has spoken about the book and his research to nearly 40 audiences all over New England and upstate New York.

The book has gone into a second hardcover printing—a rare event for a university press book.

Following the program, a just-released paperback edition of The Sedgwicks in Love, also published by Northeastern/UPNE, will be availablefor sale at the Museum and for signing by the author, through the cooperation of The Book House of Stuyvesant Plaza.

The Sedgwicks are the sons and daughters of Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives and Judge Theodore Sedgwick and his wife, Pamela Dwight Sedgwick. They had arranged marriages and

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affectionate marriages, including one in which a woman rejected a partner chosen by her father in order to marry a Sedgwick brother. The Sedgwicks had failed courtships and successful ones, from which they learned the intricate rules of courting at that time. A case of domestic violence revealed how limited a woman’s options were if she wanted to end her marriage. A squabble over an inheritance reflected how severely women’s property rights were restricted.

In the course of a long engagement, one couple exchanged nearly a hundred letters, carefully laying out their vision of their anticipated union. A sister, Catharine Maria Sedgwick, finally and deliberately chose to forego marriage in order to live the life she had envisioned for herself as a writer.

TheBoston Globe said of The Sedgwicks in Love, “Kenslea’s nonfiction narrative account of the role of marriage choices in this brave new world is an American incursion into Jane Austen

territory.”Indiana University historian Michael McGerr observed, “In these thoughtful, moving studies of courtship and marriage, [Kenslea] illuminates both the particular culture of the early United States and some of the more enduring issues of intimate relationships.” Award-winning historian Henry Wiencek commented, “The Sedgwicks in Love manages to combine scrupulous scholarship and a moving human story.”

More information about the book, reviewers’ comments and a complete list of book tour events is available at the author’s web site: http://www.freewebs.com/timothykenslea/index.htm.

The New York State Museum is a cultural program of the New York State Education Department. Started in 1836, the Museum has the longest continuously operating state natural history research and collection survey in the United States. The State Museum is located on Madison Avenue in Albany and is open daily from 9:30 a.m. to 5 p.m., except on Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year's Day. Admission is free. Further information about programs and events can be obtained by calling (518) 474-5877 or visiting the museum website at www.nysm.nysed.gov.

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