{"product_id":"matrimony-inc-francesca-beauman-9781643135786","title":"Matrimony, Inc.: From Personal Ads to Swiping Right, a Story of America Looking for Love","description":"\u003cb\u003eA clever, thoughtful, and funny history that reveals how the Union of states was built on a much more personal union of people.\u003c\/b\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eHave you ever used a dating app or website? Then you have more in common than you know with lonely homesteaders in 18th century New England. At once heartwarming and heartbreaking, \u003ci\u003eMatrimony, Inc.\u003c\/i\u003e reveals the unifying thread that weaves its way through not just marriage and relationships over the centuries, but American social history itself: advertising for love. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e Amazingly, America's first personal ad appeared in the \u003ci\u003eBoston Evening Post\u003c\/i\u003e as early as 1759. A \"person who flatters himself that he shall not be thought disagreeable\" was in search of a \"young lady, between the age of eighteen and twenty-three, of a middling stature, brown hair, of good Morals...\" As family-arranged marriages fell out of fashion, \"Husband Wanted\" or \"Seeking Wife\" ads were soon to be found in every state in the nation. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e From the woman in a Wisconsin newspaper who wanted \"no brainless dandy or foppish fool\" to the man with a glass eye who placed an ad in the \u003ci\u003eNew York Times\u003c\/i\u003e hoping to meet a woman with a glass eye, the many hundreds of personal ads that author Francesca Beauman has uncovered offer an extraordinary glimpse into the history of our hearts' desires, as well as a unique insight into American life as the frontier was settled and the cities grew. Personal ads played a surprisingly vital role in the West: couple by couple, shy smile by shy smile, letter by letter from a dusty, exhausted miner in California to a bored, frustrated seamstress in Ohio. Get ready for a new perspective on the making of modern America, a hundred words of typesetter's blurry black ink at a time. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e \"So anxious are our settlers for wives that they never ask a single lady her age. All they require is \u003ci\u003eteeth\u003c\/i\u003e,\" declared the \u003ci\u003eDubuque Iowa News\u003c\/i\u003e in 1838 in a state where men outnumbered women three to one. While the dating pools of 21st century New York, Chicago or San Francisco might not be quite so dentally-fixated, \u003ci\u003eMatrimony Inc. \u003c\/i\u003ewill put idly swiping right on Tinder into fascinating and vividly fresh historical context. What do women look for in a man? What do men look for in a woman? And how has this changed over the past 250 years?\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eAuthor:\u003c\/b\u003e Francesca Beauman\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eISBN-10:\u003c\/b\u003e 1643135783\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eISBN-13:\u003c\/b\u003e 9781643135786\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublisher:\u003c\/b\u003e Pegasus Books\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eLanguage:\u003c\/b\u003e English\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublished:\u003c\/b\u003e 10\/06\/2020\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePages:\u003c\/b\u003e 208\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eFormat:\u003c\/b\u003e Hardcover\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eWeight:\u003c\/b\u003e 0.90lbs\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eSize:\u003c\/b\u003e 9.10h x 6.10w x 0.90d\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eReview Citation(s): \u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003ePublishers Weekly\u003c\/i\u003e 08\/17\/2020\u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003eLibrary Journal\u003c\/i\u003e 10\/01\/2020 pg. 88","brand":"Francesca Beauman","offers":[{"title":"Hardcover","offer_id":43990802137343,"sku":"9781643135786","price":27.95,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0662\/2982\/9887\/files\/img_46d8e420-2611-4c88-a35a-a941c247f672.jpg?v=1683306771","url":"https:\/\/www.whiterainbookhouse.com\/products\/matrimony-inc-francesca-beauman-9781643135786","provider":"WR Book House","version":"1.0","type":"link"}