Editing Emily Bissell

{{Short description|American activist (1861–1948)}}
{{Infobox writer <!-- for more information see [[:Template:Infobox writer/doc]] -->
| name          = Emily Perkins Bissell
| image         = Emily Bissell.jpg
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| caption       = Bissell in 1907
| pseudonym     = Priscilla Leonard
| birth_name    = 
| birth_date    = {{birth date|1861|05|31}}
| birth_place   = [[Wilmington, Delaware]], U.S.
| death_date    = {{death date|1948|3|8}}
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| occupation    = Writer and charitable worker
| language      = English
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'''Emily Perkins Bissell''' (May 31, 1861 – March 8, 1948) was an American [[Social work|social worker]] and activist, best remembered for introducing [[Christmas Seals]] to the United States.<ref>{{cite magazine |url=https://content.time.com/time/subscriber/article/0,33009,930409,00.html |title=Medicine: Christmas Seals |magazine=[[Time (magazine)|Time]] |date=December 7, 1931}}</ref>

Born in [[Wilmington, Delaware]], she made a name for herself at a young age as the founder of that city's first public kindergarten and for her efforts to introduce [[child labor]] laws in that state. In 1883, she founded an organization, now known as the West End Neighborhood House that originally provided social services to Wilmington's immigrant Irish and German families. Bissell wrote under the pseudonym '''Priscilla Leonard'''.<ref>{{cite book|title=Title Women reading Shakespeare, 1660–1900: an anthology of criticism|first1=Ann|last1=Thompson|first2=Sasha|last2=Roberts|publisher=[[Manchester University Press]]|year=1997|isbn=978-0-7190-4704-6|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=oRkNAQAAIAAJ}}</ref>

==Anti-suffragism==
Bissell was closely identified with the [[Anti-suffragism|anti-suffragist]] movement.<ref>{{cite web
 |url=http://www.hsd.org/Women_AntiSuffragist_Bissell.htm
 |title=Emily P. Bissell, 1861–1948
 |publisher=Historical Society of Delaware
 |access-date=2010-10-03
 |url-status=dead
 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100813202611/http://www.hsd.org/Women_AntiSuffragist_Bissell.htm
 |archive-date=2010-08-13
}}</ref>
She wrote "The vote is part of man's work. Ballot-box, cartridge box, jury box, sentry box all go together in his part of life. Women cannot step in and take the responsibilities and duties of voting with assuming his place very largely".<ref>{{cite book
 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=4sqiGdY0zDkC&pg=PA106
 |page=106
 |title=Votes for Women!: The Woman Suffrage Movement in Tennessee, the South, and the Nation
 |author=Marjorie Spruill Wheeler
 |publisher=Univ. of Tennessee Press
 |year=1995
 |isbn=0-87049-837-1}}</ref>

In 1896 Bissell published an essay called "The Mistaken Vocation of Shakespeare's Heroines", taking the form of a report of a lecture to suffragettes. The purported speaker launches an attack on the [[Elizabethan]] playwright [[Shakespeare]] for placing his female characters in unsuitable situations, where they are not allowed to demonstrate their true abilities. For example, instead of having [[Ophelia]] as his wife, [[Hamlet]] would have been much better served by the more forceful [[Lady Macbeth]], while Macbeth himself would have been better served by [[Portia (The Merchant of Venice)|Portia]].<ref>{{cite book
 |page=233
 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=oRkNAQAAIAAJ&dq=The+Mistaken+Vocation+of+Shakespeare%27s+Heroines&pg=PA233
 |title=Women Reading Shakespeare, 1660–1900: An Anthology of Criticism
 |author1=Ann Thompson |author2=Sasha Roberts |publisher=Manchester University Press ND
 |year=1997
 |isbn=0-7190-4704-8}}</ref>
The audience greets her attack on Shakespeare with delight, ending up shouting "Down with Shakespeare!"<ref>{{cite book
 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=983sMnQCnC0C&dq=The+Mistaken+Vocation+of+Shakespeare%27s+Heroines&pg=PA63
 |page=63
 |title=Shakespeare's Comedies of Love: Essays in Honour of Alexander Leggatt
 |author1=Richard Paul Knowles |author2=Karen Bamford |author3=Alexander Leggatt |publisher=University of Toronto Press
 |year=2008
 |isbn=978-0-8020-3953-8}}</ref>
The spoof was supposed to show that it was absurd for women to seek careers.<ref>{{cite book
 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=knYtCu3aSRoC&dq=%22The+Mistaken+Vocation+of+Shakespeare%27s+Heroines%22&pg=PA24
 |page=24
 |title=Giants of the Past: Popular Fictions and the Idea of Evolution
 |author=Lisa Hopkins
 |publisher=Bucknell University Press
 |year=2004
 |isbn=0-8387-5576-3}}</ref>

In 1900, she testified before the United States Senate Committee on Woman's Suffrage, arguing that women had no place in politics.<ref name=":2">{{Cite web|last=Boylan|first=Anne M.|date=Summer 2019|title=Delaware Women's Suffrage Timeline|url=https://my.lwv.org/sites/default/files/leagues/wysiwyg/%5Bcurrent-user%3Aog-user-node%3A1%3Atitle%5D/suffrage_timeline_delaware.pdf|access-date=18 November 2020|website=Delaware Historical Society|publisher=League of Women Voters}}</ref> In March 1903 she addressed a packed meeting in [[Concord, New Hampshire]] speaking against a proposed amendment to the state constitution that would strike out the word "male" from the suffrage clause. The amendment failed to pass.<ref>{{cite book
 |url=http://www.gutenberg.org/files/30051/30051-h/30051-h.htm
 |title=The History of Woman Suffrage, Volume VI
 |editor=Ida Husted Harper
 |date=September 21, 2009
 |access-date=2010-10-05}}</ref>

==Christmas seals==
Several years later, in 1907, she was drawn to the cause of helping people with [[tuberculosis]] (TB). She had already heard of an idea in Denmark in which people attached a special stamp to their mail, the proceeds of which would go to fight the disease, and decided to introduce the same idea in Delaware. Her goal was to raise $300 for a local sanitarium, using a bright red stamp she designed herself, and convinced local post offices to sell them for just 1 cent. This way, she believed, even the poorest people could help in the fight against TB.

Though the idea failed at first, Bissell was able to gain enough publicity from a [[Philadelphia]] newspaper to make $3,000 for the [[National Tuberculosis Association]], ten times the amount she originally hoped to get. People were intrigued by the idea of [[Christmas seals]], and the following year, Howard Pyle, a notable illustrator from Wilmington, donated the design of the second stamp.

Bissell spent the remainder of her life promoting Christmas stamps and helping to eliminate tuberculosis.

==Death and legacy==
[[File:Emily Bissell, 15c, 1980 issue.jpg|thumb|upright=0.9|In 1980 the U.S. Postal Service issued a [[commemorative stamp]] in honor of Emily Bissell]]
She died on March 8, 1948, and was interred at [[Wilmington and Brandywine Cemetery]] in Wilmington, Delaware.<ref>{{cite web |title=Emily Perkins Bissell |url=https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/31352470/emily-perkins-bissell |website=www.findagrave.com |access-date=25 July 2019}}</ref> An abandoned public hospital outside Wilmington bears her name. In 1980, on the 119th anniversary of her birth, the [[U.S. Postal Service]] issued a 15 cent stamp in her honor.

==See also==
* [[Leigh Mitchell Hodges]]
* [[Einar Holbøll]], — Founder of the world's first [[Christmas seals]]

==References==
{{Reflist}}<!--added above categories/infobox footers by script-assisted edit-->

== Further reading ==
* {{cite encyclopaedia|article=Emily Perkins Bissell|author=W. David Lewis|pages=152&ndash;153|encyclopedia=Notable American Women, 1607&ndash;1950: A Biographical Dictionary|volume=2|editor1=Edward T. James |editor2=Janet Wilson James |editor3=Paul S. Boyer |publisher=Harvard University Press|date=1971|isbn=978-0-674-62734-5}}
{{Hall of Fame of Delaware Women}}
{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Bissell, Emily}}
[[Category:1861 births]]
[[Category:1948 deaths]]
[[Category:American social workers]]
[[Category:Burials at Wilmington and Brandywine Cemetery]]
[[Category:Activists from Wilmington, Delaware]]
[[Category:American Lung Association]]
[[Category:American anti-suffragists]]