The Tobacco Wives

Anthony gives Maddie insight into the Hale family and how Rose, who came from poverty but was determined to go to Broadway and become a star, chose to become a housewife instead once she met Robert Hale and learned of his family fortune. Anthony shares that the eldest Hale son, August, was a successful businessman who planned to give his mother, Cornelia, a seat on the Bright Leaf Tobacco board of directors, but he tragically died in a car accident. Maddie also learns that the working conditions at Bright Leaf Tobacco are getting increasingly worse so that they can force the women to quit before the men return from war and need jobs again. Anthony explains how the well-to-do of Bright Leaf don’t care about the factory workers or impoverished people and advises Maddie to be wary of viewing people like Mitzy as purely selfless and charitable.

Once alone, Maddie begins reading the book that Cornelia shared with her and realizes that it is about the role women played as advocates for change in social reform movements. Maddie is inspired and thrilled by the stories of these women, realizing “that women had been working behind the scenes, making things happen as far back as the 1800s” (155).