Sara L. Latta

I Could Not Do Otherwise by Sara Latta is a biography of Dr. Mary Edwards Walker, who was born in 1832 and fought against societal and political conventions all her life. While the book is about Mary Walker, it contains a wealth of information about not only the national events happening during her life, but about many public figures of the time, particularly other forward-thinking women such as Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Lucretia Mott, Elizabeth Blackwell, and Susan B. Anthony. Mary Walker personally knew many famous personages of the time. The book is liberally sprinkled with photographs which add to its attractiveness.

Mary Walker was among the first females to graduate from medical school. When the Civil War broke out, she volunteered to be an army surgeon but was refused, despite the desperate need for doctors, because the Army did not have any women. She chose to volunteer as a civilian. She worked near the front lines during major battles, sometimes crossing over into Confederate territory, and eventually spied for the Union. She was captured by the Confederate army, serving four months in one of the most notorious civil war prisons. While there she treated other inmates in the best manner possible under the circumstances. She is the only woman to have received the Medal of Honor and one of only eight civilians to have done so.

Dr. Walker campaigned ceaselessly for a change in conventional women’s clothing. She considered corsets to be bad for women’s health, as they impaired breathing and digestion. She believed the floor-length dresses of the time to be gatherers of dirt and filth. She never wore a corset, and from an early age working on her parent’s farm, she wore a type of pant under a shorter dress. As an adult, she wore pants under shortened dresses, and eventually her manner of dress was nearer to that of men’s dress. She was arrested numerous times for this but was always released from custody.

Dr. Walker was an abolitionist, prohibitionist, and early suffragist. The initial stance of the women’s suffragist movement, following her lead, was to claim that women already had the right to vote, and Congress needed only to enact enabling legislation. Following the war, she became a lecturer and writer. She fell out of favor with the suffragist movement and unfortunately, she has become all but unknown to the world. It is deplorable, as Mary Walker was a multitalented and accomplished woman that everyone should be aware of.

The book is promoted as a young adult book, specifically for ages 13 – 18. At 208 densely filled pages, I am not sure that many young people near the lower end of this age suggestion would finish the book. It is interesting, yes, but so packed with detail that I think many younger readers would lose interest far before the end. At times, the book reads a bit like an encyclopedia entry or history textbook. Some parents might object to a brief section on Dr. Walker’s book, Unmasked, or the Science of Immorality: To Gentlemen. The description of the book contains talk of sex, masturbation, and intersex individuals.

Sara Latta researched her subject very thoroughly which shows in the exhaustive details she includes about Mary Edwards and the 19th century. The book features in-depth Source Notes, Selected Bibliography, and Photo Acknowledgments. Ms. Latta has a smooth writing style which is easy to read. She is clearly a talented writer of non-fiction.… (altro)