The Proof Is in the Dough: Rural Southern Women, Extension, and Making Money

＂The Proof Is in the Dough examines how rural white and African American women in Alabama and Florida used the Cooperative Extension Service’s home demonstration programming between 1914 and 1929 as a means to earn extra income. Kathryn L. Beasley explores an area of rural women’s history that has not been closely examined-that is, how rural American women involved with home demonstration used the skills they learned as a way to better themselves economically. Furthermore, Beasley traces how this extra income allowed these women to shape their own producing and consuming habits＂--

KATHRYN L. BEASLEY received her PhD in history from Florida State University. She grew up with a close association with the Cooperative Extension Service, which sparked her interest in agricultural and rural history. She is a recipient of the Southern Association for Women Historians’ A. Elizabeth Taylor Prize for the best article in the field of southern women’s history. Her writing has also appeared in the Alabama Review, Florida Historical Quarterly, the Journal of the NACAA, Peanut Science, and the White House Quarterly.