The Queen of the Platform: A Novel of Women’s Rights Activist Ernestine Rose will be released in March 2024! You can pre-order the Kindle edition here.
Born to a Jewish family in Poland, Ernestine Louise Susmond Potowski as a teenager rejected both religion and the marriage her father, a rabbi, arranged for her. She spent time in Berlin, Paris, and London before emigrating with her husband, William Ella Rose, to the United States in 1836. Within just a few months of her arrival in New York City, she began speaking in public and campaigning for women’s property rights. Although little known today, in the nineteenth century she was highly regarded both as a speaker and as an advocate for progressive causes. Susan B. Anthony, who often shared the platform with her, kept a portrait of Ernestine in her office and named her as one of the three women (the other two being Mary Wollstonecraft and Frances Wright) who should lead the “Honor Roll” of early advocates for women’s rights.
While you’re waiting on the completed novel, please enjoy this peer-reviewed article I published detailing my findings about Ernestine Rose’s early life and family–including information that has never been published before.
(courtesy of Library of Congress)