Women in American History: A Social, Political, and Cultural Encyclopedia and Document Collection. Edited by Peg A. Lamphier and Rosanne Welch. Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO, 2017. 4 vol., 1828 p. $415 (ISBN: 978-1-61069-602-9). E-book (978-1-61069-603-6) available, call for pricing.

To this day, high school and college students rarely learn about the role of women in American history, cultures, or politics. Teachers and textbooks still focus predominantly on the white Christian heterosexual males that continue to take most of the credit for building the United States of America. While it is fact that, for most of American history, only white men could own land, vote, and serve in government, women of all races, religions, and sexual orientations have done a great deal to advance American culture, fight for justice, and impact the laws, businesses, scientific research, and education systems that have developed in the United States over time. Several women make an appearance in traditional American social studies classrooms: Sacajawea, Harriet Tubman, Susan B. Anthony, Helen Keller, and perhaps now Hillary Clinton—but there are so many stories and events left untold. An up to date encyclopedia about American women just might help those teachers, professors, and students who are searching for more. For those who wish to go beyond the typical American history curriculum, I highly recommend Women in American History: A Social, Political, and Cultural Encyclopedia and Document Collection.

Editors Peg A. Lamphier and Rosanne Welch are not the usual suspects for writing a women’s history encyclopedia. While Lamphier integrates women’s issues into the American history courses that she teaches at the California Polytechnical Institute of Pomona and Mount San Antonio College, her co-editor Rosanne Welch has a background in television and documentary film. Before working on this project, however, Welch edited the well-regarded Encyclopedia of Women in Aviation and Space (ABC-CLIO, 1998), which compiled the scattered bits and pieces of women’s history in these male-dominated fields into one publication. This was no easy feat; the encyclopedia was praised for its comprehensiveness but critiqued for the structure of its entries. Welch appears to have learned from her first encyclopedia editing experience, and Lamphier and Welch worked together so well on Women in American History that they are working on another encyclopedia series together about technology and innovation for ABC-CLIO, which will also include the female impact on science and technology.

The main editors of this encyclopedia series, as well as the ninety four contributors from around the world, have done an extraordinary job capturing all things female-identified in American history, from berdaches to third wave feminism. The strength of this series lies in its attention to the diversity of women’s issues, cultures, and histories within the United States. The four volumes, arranged in chronological order, contain more than 750 entries and over 195 primary source documents. Each volume is divided into three historical sections. Volume 1: Precolonial America to the Early Republic, covers precolonial North America (pre-1607), colonial North America (1607–1754), and Revolutionary America and the New Republic (1754–1819). Volume 2: Antebellum America through the Gilded Age, spans the Antebellum Era (1820–1860), the Civil War and Reconstruction (1861–1877), and the Gilded Age (1878–1899). Volume 3: Progressive Era through World War II, surveys the Progressive Era (1900–1929), the Great Depression and the New Deal (1930–1941), and World War II (1939–1945). Finally, Volume 4: Cold War America to Today, addresses Cold War America (1946–1962), Second-Wave Feminism (1963–1989) and Third-Wave Feminism (1990-Present). The first volume of the series begins with a timeline of major events accomplished by or impacting women, and each section begins with a well-researched historical overview of entries associated with the featured period.

Primary source documents, including speeches, cookbooks, and laws that have impacted women—including sodomy laws and slave codes—accompany a significant percentage of the entries. It would have been terrific if the series had included a resource list for those interested in searching for more primary source documents about American women, or at least a credited source for each document. This could motivate someone to do more research outside of the encyclopedia. The breadth of the entries, however, and the sensitivity to multiculturalism, religious diversity, and recognition of women and movements from Native American, African American, Latina, Asian American, Jewish, and queer populations in every volume, however, more than make up for that omission.

While other strong encyclopedias on women in the United States exist, most are now at least fifteen years old. The Encyclopedia of Women’s History in America (Facts on File, 2000) has over 500 entries for significant women, laws, court cases, organizations, and publications with some omissions of more controversial topics. A frequently praised work, Handbook of American Women’s History (Garland, 1990), is now nearly thirty years old and only focuses on the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Great Lives from History: American Women (Salem Press, 2016) covers the lives of prominent, diverse American women from colonial times to the present, but does not include the historical background, laws, and other information included in Women in American History. Yes, librarians, it is time to update that moldy reference collection and add this volume, whether in print or as an E-book.—Rachel Wexelbaum, Associate Professor/Collection Management Librarian, St. Cloud State University, St. Cloud, Minnesota