New Hampshire 's Sarah Josepha Hale , widowed in 1822 with five children to support, began a career as a professional writer. In 1828, she moved to Boston and assumed the editorship of America 's first magazine tailored exclusively for women, Boston Lady's Magazine. As editor, Hale used the publication to broadcast her support for women's education. Additionally, Hale eliminated engravings and fashion plates from Boston Lady's, keeping sheet music as the magazine's only “extra feature.”

Although Hale championed the improvement of women's education and involvement in professions such as academia, medicine, and writing, she refrained from participation in the emerging women's rights movement. In support of existing social standards, Hale furthered the ideology of separate male and female spheres. She insisted that women abstain from the “masculine” realms of government, politics, or business.

By 1836, outstanding unpaid subscriptions for Boston Lady's forced Hale to move to Philadelphia and merge her magazine with that of Louis Godey. The partners established Godey's Lady's Book in 1837. Although it was expensive, Godey's soon became the most widely read periodical in the nation. Hale continued to write on topics such as women's education and eventually reevaluated her perspective on separate male and female social spheres, although never formally joining the suffrage movement.

Fashion plates and engravings eventually found their way back into Hale's periodical, but she also argued for greater economic independence for women and especially for female physicians. Her support of women's education influenced the founders of Vassar College in 1869. She may be most famous, however, for persuading Abraham Lincoln to declare Thanksgiving during the midst of the Civil War.