Amelia Jenks Bloomer

Amelia Jenks Bloomer 1818-94, American reformer, b. Homer, N.Y. She was editor (1848-54) of the Lily, first published in Seneca Falls, N.Y., and devoted to women's rights and to temperance. In 1851 she recommended and adopted the reformed dress of short skirt and full trousers introduced by Elizabeth Smith Miller. Because she advertised it in the Lily and wore it in her lecture work, it became universally known as the Bloomer costume, or bloomers.

Bibliography: See biography by her husband, D. C. Bloomer (1895); C. N. Gattey, The Bloomer Girls (1968).

Bloomer, Amelia Jenks (1818–94), temperance and woman suffrage reformer, who published The Lily (1848–54), a periodical devoted to these causes. She adopted a reformed trouser dress for women, which was named “bloomers”in her honor. She is the subject of Bloomer Girl (1944), a musical comedy.

Bloomer, Amelia Jenks (1818–94) US women's rights campaigner. She published Lily, the first US magazine for women, between 1849 and 1854. She subsequently continued as editor, and wrote articles on education, marriage laws and female suffrage. As part of her campaign, she popularized the full trousers for women that became known as “bloomers”.