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Agency History/Biographical note:
Jennie Lord Winslow was born on May 23, 1895 in North Brookfield, Massachusetts. Her father was David F. Winslow, a mechanic. She attended North Brookfield High School and graduated in 1912. In September 1912 she entered Mount Holyoke College, where she majored in history and graduated with a B.A. in 1916. She taught English and history in Rutland, Vermont (1916-1917), English and physical training in an Amesbury, Massachusetts high school (1917), and physical culture, English, and sewing at a Fairhaven, Massachusetts high school (1918). She also took a physical training summer course at Harvard in the summer of 1918. In 1922 she married Ulric Jordan Lebourveau, a hardware dealer. They lived briefly in Houma, Louisiana and returned to North Brookfield by 1923 where their first son was born. They then moved to Somerville, New Jersey and had two more children. For several years she was a foster mother who worked for the Children's Aid Society of Newark. She died at the age of sixty-four on March 23, 1960 in Somerville, New Jersey.

Scope and Content:
The Jennie L. Lebourveau Papers consist of a scrapbook, correspondence, and biographical information. The material chiefly relates to her time as a Mount Holyoke College student, 1912-1916. The letters that she wrote home twice each week primarily reflect her daily life, student traditions, and student jobs and finances. Traditions discussed in her letters include Senior-Freshman Reception, Junior Prom, Top Spinning, Mountain Day, Senior Mountain Day, and Vespers. She also describes the jobs she held to earn money for tuition, which included waiting tables, cleaning rooms, working in the post office, brushing a friend's hair, and hand-tinting cards for a firm in Chicago. She comments about the relations between students of different social classes and she indicates that students  respected one another regardless of employment. Many of the letters outline the schedule she followed during the day including meals, classes, socializing, and studying. Academics are addressed at length and she refers to the books she was reading and the subjects that she studied (history, physiology, English, zoology, music and gymnastics). References to professors include Nellie Neilson (history), Margaret Lord (mathematics), Ann Haven Morgan and Christianna Smith (zoology), and Sarah Truair Hollands (chemistry). She frequently complains about the food and expressed excitement over sharing food packages sent from parents to her circle of friends. She discusses room choosing, clothing, the elimination of the domestic work system, and the addition of new buildings to campus, including Skinner Hall and Student-Alumnae Hall (later Mary Woolley Hall). She occasionally mentions World War I, women's suffrage, and Woodrow Wilson's election. For example, in a letter written shortly attending a lecture on woman's suffrage (April 20, 1913) she refers to some of the history faculty as "rank women suffragists." She was also an avid participant in campus activities ranging from debate to theater to athletics, and this is documented both in her letters and in her scrapbook. The scrapbook consists primarily of pieces of memorabilia related to events at Mount Holyoke College. Items include party invitations, theater and music programs, notes from friends, and letters from the college administration are accompanied by brief captions. Of note are a Mount Holyoke College secret ballot for the 1912 mock presidential election with a caption about her political affiliation and letters from the administration from the time she was applying to college through her graduation. The biographical information consists of a biographical note, a Massachusetts high school teacher's certificate from September 29, 1916, and a few newspaper clippings, 1917-1960.

Cite as: Jennie L. Lebourveau Papers, Mount Holyoke College, Archives and Special Collections, South Hadley, MA.

Access Restrictions: Unrestricted.

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