{"id":149,"date":"2025-08-12T16:58:44","date_gmt":"2025-08-12T16:58:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/commons.mtholyoke.edu\/internationalstudents\/?page_id=149"},"modified":"2025-09-25T17:13:50","modified_gmt":"2025-09-25T17:13:50","slug":"susanna-major","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/commons.mtholyoke.edu\/internationalstudents\/susanna-major\/","title":{"rendered":"Susanna Major, class of 1843"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"Essay<\/a>
\u201cThe Sphere and Education of Women\u201d essay by Susanna Major, class of 1843, in \u201cOriginal Compositions and Selected Articles, 1838-1849\u201d, collected by Abigail Moore Burgess, class of 1848. Click on the image to see the entire essay.<\/sub><\/sup><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Susanna Major, class of 1843, who came from Ontario, Canada was the first international student to study at the Mount Holyoke Female Seminary. In 1843, she wrote an essay titled \u201cThe Sphere and Education of Women,\u201d in an anthology of essays and articles written by Mount Holyoke women. Titled \u201cOriginal Compositions and Selected Articles, 1838-1849\u201d, this anthology was collected by Abigail Moore Burgess, a graduate of Mount Holyoke\u2019s first class, the class of 1838, and a niece of Mount Holyoke founder, Mary Lyon. In her piece Major wrote \u201cAs gravity pervades every particle of matter, and is secretly diffused throughout the material creation, so the influence of woman, pervading the family circle, extends to communities and nations, and finally has a mighty bearing on the destiny of the world. If this be so, why should not a woman’s education meet the demands of her sphere and capacities?\u201d Although the idea that the value of women’s education was dependent on her role as a mother and homemaker may seem antiquated now, in 1842 when Major wrote her essay this concept was one of women\u2019s rights advocates most successful arguments. One example is the U.S. Children\u2019s Bureau, founded in 1912, which was staffed primarily by women and advocated policies that Frances Perkins, class of 1902, who was the U.S. Labor Secretary under President Franklin Roosevelt, would later promote. The value of an educated mother appears often among the writings of early Mount Holyoke international students, many of whom attended to receive the education necessary to further women\u2019s education back in their communities.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Susanna Major, class of 1843, who came from Ontario, Canada was the first international student to study at the Mount Holyoke Female Seminary. In 1843, she wrote an essay titled \u201cThe Sphere and Education of Women,\u201d in an anthology of essays and articles written by Mount Holyoke women. Titled \u201cOriginal Compositions and Selected Articles, 1838-1849\u201d, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2199,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"page-templates\/page-nosidebar.php","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-149","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/commons.mtholyoke.edu\/internationalstudents\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/149","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/commons.mtholyoke.edu\/internationalstudents\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/commons.mtholyoke.edu\/internationalstudents\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/commons.mtholyoke.edu\/internationalstudents\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2199"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/commons.mtholyoke.edu\/internationalstudents\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=149"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/commons.mtholyoke.edu\/internationalstudents\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/149\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":824,"href":"https:\/\/commons.mtholyoke.edu\/internationalstudents\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/149\/revisions\/824"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/commons.mtholyoke.edu\/internationalstudents\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=149"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}