|
 Beatrix
Potter
Not As She Would
But As She Could
By Ann Wamack
Beatrix Potter
has delighted generations of children with
her animal stories, including
"The Tale of Peter Rabbit." But this is not
the fame nor the career she would have
intended.
Born in 1866 of wealthy parents, Helen
Beatrix Potter
spent much of her childhood alone with her
pet
animals. Her father, educated as an
attorney, spent
more of his time in exclusive clubs than
practicing
law. Her mother spent her days as a
socialite.
Bertram, her younger brother, was sent off
to an
expensive boarding school and was seldom
home, while
Beatrix received most of her education at
home from a
succession of governesses.
Beatrix spent many hours observing and
drawing
pictures of her childhood pets, particularly
her two
rabbits, Benjamin and Peter. Her actual
interests were
far more serious; she had a passion for
science.
Beatrix preferred to spend her hours
observing fungi,
algae and lichens through her microscope and
recording
the images in watercolor paintings, as was
the custom
of the day before photography became widely
available.
Her uncle was impressed with her work and
nominated
her as a student at the Royal Botanical
Gardens at
Kew. Her application was summarily rejected
because
she was female. Her parents discouraged her
from
pursuing an "inappropriate" career in
science, as they
saw only frustration and disappointment in
it.
Instead, they set Beatrix in charge of
running their
household.
Even while sharing her time with the
administration of her parents’ substantial
household affairs, Beatrix continued to
spend hours observing algae, spores and
fungi, and producing hundreds of richly
detailed watercolors. Through her
illustrations, she because well respected in
the scientific community, but remained
unwelcome in the Linnean Society meetings
based on her gender. In the early years of
the 1900s, Beatrix tried a new venture. Now
in her thirties, she began reaching back to
her childhood memories of her animal
friends, telling her now-famous "Tale of
Peter Rabbit," which she also illustrated in
her watercolors. The economic success of
this and her subsequent works provided
Beatrix with a source of income independent
from her parents’ money. Beatrix was 36
years old when the first of her enchanting
animal stories and illustrations was
published in 1902.
But her new-found success was to be cut
short.
Her writing and illustrations began
declining, fading
with her failing eyesight. Increasingly
unable to
write or draw, Beatrix moved to the Lake
District of
Sawry, England where she had been investing
much of
her royalty income into buying land for
farming and
conservation. She married in her later years
but
remained childless.
Some reports of her later years in the Lake
District describe a woman of some
bitterness. Her
first career choice had been denied her
because she
was a woman. Turning to an alternate career,
she
received acclaim for her children’s stories,
only to
have this success cut short by poor
eyesight. Beatrix
may have been despondent about this latest
twist of
fate but she was not to be defeated. As she
gave up
writing, she increasingly turned her
attention to her
home, her marriage and to sheep breeding.
Her
indomitable spirit showed through again and,
in her
sixties, she was elected by her peers to be
the first
woman president of Herdwick Sheep-Breeders
Association.
By her death in 1943, Beatrix Potter Heelis
had
amassed an estate of 4,000 acres. In her
will, she
donated her land to the National Trust, now
part of
the Lake District National Park.
~Ann lives in rural Searcy, Arkansas with
her military
husband,
Paul, and one daughter. She holds an MBA in
Accounting
and enjoys writing articles on many topics.
Please visit
www.annwamack.com for more information
about Ann and
her many interests. |
