Ladies and Gentlemen on Display: Planter Society at the Virginia Springs, 1790-1860 (The American South Series)
Easily the best study of gentility in the Old South to date.—Georgia Historical QuarterlyIn the special time and place carved out by Springs-goers, we can see with new sharpness both the divisions between the sexes—in terms of power and morality—as well as the way they worked together to give substance to their distinctive society and maintain their influence within it. Ladies and Gentleman on DisplayI reveals how much the Springs experience intersected with the other key aspects of southern social life.(Steven M. StoweIndiana UniversityBloomington, author ofIntimacy and Power in the Old South: Ritual in the Lives of the Planters)