Martha Saxton Explained

Martha Saxton
Birth Name:	Martha Porter Saxton
Birth Date:	3 September 1945
Birth Place:	New York City, U.S.
Death Place:	Norfolk, Connecticut, U.S.
Alma Mater:	Columbia University, University of Chicago
Discipline:	History
Sub Discipline:	Women's studies, gender studies
Workplaces:	Amherst College

Martha Porter Saxton (September 3, 1945 – July 18, 2023) was an American professor of history and women's and gender studies at Amherst College who authored several prominent historical biographies.

Life

Martha Porter Saxton was born in Manhattan on September 3, 1945. Her parents worked in the publishing industry.^[1] She graduated from Columbia University, and University of Chicago.

Saxton taught at Amherst College,^[2] and Hampshire County Jail and House of Correction.^{[3] [4]}

In 2003, she wrote Being Good: Women's Moral Values in Early America.^[5] The TV film The Jayne Mansfield Story featuring Loni Anderson and Arnold Schwarzenegger was based on her book Jayne Mansfield and the American Fifties.^[6]

Saxton also published findings of a classroom experiment on Wikipedia's inclusion of women in historical articles. In her course, "Women's History 1865-Present," Saxton guided students as they identified Wikipedia articles that would benefit from additional information regarding women's involvement in a given topic (e.g. the Shaker movement). Students conducted academic research on the topic of their choosing and then revised Wikipedia pages accordingly. ^[7] She was a recipient of the PEN New England Award.

Martha Saxton died of lung cancer at her home in Norfolk, Connecticut, on July 18, 2023, at the age of 77.^[1]

Publications

Books

• The Widow Washington: The Life of Mary Washington (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2019)., ^[8]
• Being Good: Women's Moral Values in Early America (Hill and Wang, 2003).,
• Interpretations of American History (seventh edition) with Frank Couvares (previously edited by Gerald Grob and George Billias), Free Press, Spring 2000.
• Louisa May Alcott

A Modern Biography (Houghton Mifflin, 1977) (Avon, 1978; Farrar Straus & Giroux, 1995).,

• Jayne Mansfield and the American Fifties (Houghton Mifflin, 1976) (Bantam, 1976).,

Essays, reviews, and other

• "Lives of Missouri Slave Women: A Critique of true Womanhood," in eds. Manisha Sinha and Penny Von Eschen, Contested Democracy: Freedom, Race and Power in American History, Columbia U. Press, 2007.
• "Curing Gender Amnesia," Women's Review of Books 24.1 (Jan Feb 2007): 24.
• "Masquerade: the Life and Times of Deborah Sampson, Continental Soldier," by Alfred Young, in The William and Mary Quarterly, forthcoming.
• "River Gods-and Goddesses. Women's Review of Books 21.9 (June 2004): 10.
• "Neither Lady Nor Slave," The S.C. Historical Magazinheae, October 2004.
• "La Formazione degli Stati Uniti," Journal of American History, February, 2004.
• "Sexism and the City," Journal of Urban History, January, 2003.
• "Examining our Revolutionary Baggage," Reviews in American History, December, 2000
• "The Moral Minority, Prescriptive Literature in Early St. Louis," Gateway-Heritage, The Quarterly Magazine of the Missouri Historical Society (Fall 2000): 18–31.
• "Women Without Rights," in Not for Ourselves Alone, ed. by Geoffrey C. Ward and Ken Burns (New York: A. A. Knopf, Inc., 1999), 52–57.
• "Puritan Women: The Seeds of a Critical Tradition," History Today, 44.10 (Sept./Oct. 1994): 28–33.
• "Civil War Nurses," in The Face of Mercy, A Photographic History of Medicine at War, ed. by Matthew Naythons, and William Styron (San Francisco: Epicenter, 1993).

Awards and honors

• Whiting Travel Fellowship, 2012
• Cullman Fellow, New York Public Library, 2007–2008
• Doshisha Lecturer, Doshisha University, Kyoto, Japan (2006)
• Miner D. Crary Award, Amherst College (2000-2001)
• Bunting Fellow, Radcliffe College (1995-1996)
• Mellon Fellow, Society of Fellows in the Humanities, Columbia (1988-1990)
• Lane Cooper Award, Columbia (1987-1988)
• Mary Ellen Shimke Award, Wellesley College (1986-1987)
• Presidential Fellow, Columbia (1985–88)
• Boston Globe Annual Award for Louisa May Alcott (1977)

Scholarly and professional activities

• Member, Authors' Guild
• Member, PEN, Secretary of PEN Executive Board, 1986-1989
• Member, PEN/Martha Albrand Award Committee, 1992
• Member, Willie Lee Rose Prize Committee, 1996 (Southern Association for Women's Historians)
• Member, Julia Spruill Prize Committee, 1999 (Southern Association for Women's Historians)
• Member, Louis Pelzer Memorial Award Committee, AHA, 2005-6
• Co-founder and co-editor of The Journal of the History of Childhood and Youth, with Laura Lovett^[9]

External links

• Macmillan
• Amherst College
• University of Massachusetts

Notes and References

1. Web site: Risen . Clay . Martha Saxton, Historian Who Explored Women’s Lives, Dies at 77 . . July 20, 2023.
2. Web site: Faculty & Staff Saxton, Martha Amherst College. www.amherst.edu. 2019-07-15.
3. Web site: Inside/Outside Amherst College-Hampshire jail collaboration 'eyeopener' for all. Lederman. Diane. 2015-12-17. masslive.com. en-US. 2019-07-15.
4. Web site: Martha Saxton. www.washcoll.edu. en. 2019-07-15.
5. News: Nonfiction Book Review: BEING GOOD: Women's Moral Values in Early America by Martha Saxton, Author . Hill and Wang $30 (416p) ISBN 978-0-374-11011-6. PublishersWeekly.com. 2018-10-08. en.
6. "The Television Picture", The Milwaukee Journal, page 4, 1982-04-27
7. 2013. Nawrotzki. Kristen. Writing History in the Digital Age. Digital Humanities. en. 10.3998/dh.12230987.0001.001. free.
8. Web site: ‘The Widow Washington’ Review: Mary, Mother of George. DuVal. Kathleen. WSJ. en-US. 2019-07-15.
9. Saxton . Martha. . 2007 . Introduction . The Journal of the History of Childhood and Youth . en . 1 . 1 . 1–3 . 10.1353/hcy.2008.0014 . 1941-3599.