Women Traveling by Themselves in Nineteenth-Century America

Women's independent travel and the negotiation of risk and respectability

Women Traveling by Themselves in Nineteenth-Century America is a critical anthology of travel writing by women who journeyed without male escort. The collection brings together diaries, rare publications, and selections from canonical writers such as Harriet Martineau, Margaret Fuller, and Isabella Bird, alongside lesser known figures, including Rachael Morgan Ball, whose diary is published here for the first time.

By framing selections with substantive editorial introductions, David J. Langum Sr. situates these texts within broader debates about gender, mobility, and independence. Rather than focusing solely on literary expression, the anthology foregrounds the material and social dimensions of travel, revealing the perils and possibilities women encountered on the road.

These accounts challenge assumptions that independent female travel was exceptionally dangerous while illuminating women's agency during a period of dynamic social and technological change. This anthology is ideal for courses in women's history and life writing, transportation history, and mobility studies.