Offers an intriguing glimpse into the daily life of an average Toronto
woman in the mid-nineteenth century.
Mary Armstrong's diaries are a window into the daily life of a
middle-class woman in a new and changing land, and a revealing account
of life in early Toronto just before and after confederation. Her
journals are one of very few published by Canadian women, especially
women outside the upper classes, in the decades surrounding the
mid-nineteenth century.
Mary Armstrong was the wife of a butcher / farmer who lived in what is
now the Yorkville and Deer Park area of Toronto from the 1830s to the
1880s. She had immigrated with her parents and siblings from England in
1834. Her diaries, which cover five months in 1859 and eight months in
1869, reflect her multiplicity of interests and concerns including
family, women's work, faith, status and class, occupation and trade,
community networks, and local and national identity.
Jackson W. Armstrong's introduction examines who Mary was, what her
world was like, and how she saw her own place in it; it also explains
the origin and history of the diaries. His extensive primary research
supports the well-annotated diaries, and gives contextual information on
the events, people, and places that Mary mentions.
Seven Eggs Today offers new information and a new perspective on
mid-Victorian English Canada, and will be welcomed by general readers
and scholars interested in colonial life, biography, immigrant
experiences, family or local history, or women's studies.
