The Library of Virginia >> Exhibitions >> Working Out Her Destiny | |
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Where are the Women: Examples from the LVA Collections The Invisible Economy |
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Introduction Where are the Women: |
Testimony taken during the investigation and trials following the murder of Lucy Pollard in Lunenburg County in 1895 disclosed fascinating details about how women in rural Virginia provided for their families and engaged in exchanges of goods and services. When describing where they were when they first learned about Pollard's death, Pokey Barnes told how she and her mother, Mary Barnes, had walked to Ellen Gayle's house and negotiated an exchange of a chicken for some cornmeal and a child's dress:
In her book on the Lucy Pollard mystery, the historian Suzanne Lebsock wrote, "This was the hidden economy of the poor, a ceaseless exchange among women who struck deals in person and moved goods, one house to another, on bare feet." |