
A Midwife’s Tale
The Life of Martha Ballard, Based on Her Diary, 1785-1812
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Narrated by:
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Susan Ericksen
About this listen
Drawing on the diaries of one woman in 18th-century Maine, this intimate history illuminates the medical practices, household economies, religious rivalries, and sexual mores of the New England frontier.
Between 1785 and 1812, a midwife and healer named Martha Ballard kept a diary that recorded her arduous work (in 27 years she attended 816 births) as well as her domestic life in Hallowell, Maine. On the basis of that diary, Laurel Thatcher Ulrich gives us an intimate and densely imagined portrait, not only of the industrious and reticent Martha Ballard but of her society. At once lively and impeccably scholarly, A Midwife's Tale is a triumph of history on a human scale.
©1990 Laurel Thatcher Ulrich (P)2017 TantorListeners also enjoyed...
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Story
It is 1936, and Nancy Wake is an intrepid Australian expat living in Paris who has bluffed her way into a reporting job for Hearst newspaper when she meets the wealthy French industrialist Henri Fiocca. No sooner does Henri sweep Nancy off her feet and convince her to become Mrs. Fiocca than the Germans invade France and she takes yet another name: a code name. As Lucienne Carlier, Nancy smuggles people and documents across the border and earns a new nickname from the Gestapo for her remarkable ability to evade capture: The White Mouse.
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Mixed Feelings
- By carpsmarsh on 02-14-21
By: Ariel Lawhon
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Quackery
- A Brief History of the Worst Ways to Cure Everything
- By: Lydia Kang, Nate Pedersen
- Narrated by: Hillary Huber
- Length: 10 hrs and 29 mins
- Unabridged
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What won't we try in our quest for perfect health, beauty, and the fountain of youth? Well, just imagine a time when doctors prescribed morphine for crying infants. When liquefied gold was touted as immortality in a glass. And when strychnine - yes, that strychnine, the one used in rat poison - was dosed like Viagra. Looking back with fascination, horror, and not a little dash of dark, knowing humor, Quackery recounts the lively, at times unbelievable, history of medical misfires and malpractices.
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Computer-generated Narrator. Dated Humour.
- By Nemo on 12-28-18
By: Lydia Kang, and others
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Call the Midwife
- A Memoir of Birth, Joy, and Hard Times
- By: Jennifer Worth
- Narrated by: Nicola Barber
- Length: 12 hrs and 1 min
- Unabridged
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At the age of 22, Jennifer Worth left her comfortable home to move into a convent and become a midwife in postwar London’s East End slums. The colorful characters she met while delivering babies all over London - from the plucky, warm-hearted nuns with whom she lived to the woman with 24 children who couldn't speak English to the prostitutes and dockers of the city’s seedier side - illuminate a fascinating time in history.
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The best book I've listened to this year
- By Richard on 06-12-13
By: Jennifer Worth
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I Was Anastasia
- A Novel
- By: Ariel Lawhon
- Narrated by: Jane Collingwood, Sian Thomas, Ariel Lawhon
- Length: 13 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
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Russia, July 17, 1918: Under direct orders from Vladimir Lenin, Bolshevik secret police force Anastasia Romanov, along with the entire imperial family, into a damp basement in Siberia where they face a merciless firing squad. None survives. At least that is what the executioners have always claimed.
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Even knowing the true story,still enjoyed the book
- By Emily on 04-02-18
By: Ariel Lawhon
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Geisha, a Life
- By: Mineko Iwasaki, Rande Brown
- Narrated by: Cindy Kay
- Length: 9 hrs and 49 mins
- Unabridged
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In Geisha, a Life, Mineko Iwasaki tells her story, from her warm early childhood, to her intense yet privileged upbringing in the Iwasaki okiya (household), to her years as a renowned geisha, and finally, to her decision at the age of 29 to retire and marry, a move that would mirror the demise of geisha culture. Mineko brings to life the beauty and wonder of Gion Kobu, a place that "existed in a world apart, a special realm whose mission and identity depended on preserving the time-honored traditions of the past."
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Good Bio but Memoirs is much more entertaining…
- By Seirene on 07-06-21
By: Mineko Iwasaki, and others
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The Midwife's Tale
- A Mystery
- By: Sam Thomas
- Narrated by: Leila Birch
- Length: 10 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
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It is 1644, and Parliament’s armies have risen against the King and laid siege to the city of York. Even as the city suffers at the rebels’ hands, midwife Bridget Hodgson becomes embroiled in a different sort of rebellion. One of Bridget’s friends, Esther Cooper, has been convicted of murdering her husband and sentenced to be burnt alive. Convinced that her friend is innocent, Bridget sets out to find the real killer.
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Only so so
- By Marie on 11-13-13
By: Sam Thomas
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Barriers to Entry
- Blaze Collection
- By: Ariel Lawhon
- Narrated by: Kate Reading
- Length: 1 hr and 14 mins
- Unabridged
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You will have ninety minutes to solve the murder. A startling declaration by a new Harvard instructor: sixty-seven-year-old Frances Glessner Lee. It’s 1945. Before her, six wary male students given to assumptions—especially when it comes to women without a formal education—are challenged to solve a real-life whodunit using Mrs. Lee’s creation, the crime scene diorama. Every detail is accurate. And every detail matters when solving a crime with no survivors…
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Whodunit?!
- By EJ on 02-25-24
By: Ariel Lawhon
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My Name Is Resolute
- By: Nancy E. Turner
- Narrated by: Mhairi Morrison
- Length: 25 hrs and 55 mins
- Unabridged
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The year is 1729, and Resolute Talbot and her siblings are captured by pirates, taken from their family in Jamaica and brought to the New World. Resolute and her sister are sold into slavery in colonial New England and taught the trade of spinning and weaving. When Resolute finds herself alone in Lexington, Massachusetts, she struggles to find her way in a society that is quick to judge a young woman without a family. As the seeds of rebellion against England grow, Resolute is torn between following the rules and breaking free.
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A life well lived!
- By Anonymous User on 06-20-23
By: Nancy E. Turner
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The Frozen River
- A Novel
- By: Ariel Lawhon
- Narrated by: Jane Oppenheimer, Ariel Lawhon
- Length: 15 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
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Maine, 1789: When the Kennebec River freezes, entombing a man in the ice, Martha Ballard is summoned to examine the body and determine cause of death. As a midwife and healer, she is privy to much of what goes on behind closed doors in Hallowell. Her diary is a record of every birth and death, crime and debacle that unfolds in the close-knit community. Months earlier, Martha documented the details of an alleged rape committed by two of the town’s most respected gentlemen—one of whom has now been found dead in the ice.
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Oh dear
- By Barbara on 12-08-23
By: Ariel Lawhon
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Thomas Jefferson and Sally Hemings
- An American Controversy
- By: Annette Gordon-Reed
- Narrated by: Allyson Johnson
- Length: 12 hrs and 57 mins
- Unabridged
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When Annette Gordon-Reed's groundbreaking study was first published, rumors of Thomas Jefferson's sexual involvement with his slave Sally Hemings had circulated for two centuries. Among all aspects of Jefferson's renowned life, it was perhaps the most hotly contested topic. Thomas Jefferson and Sally Hemings intensified this debate by identifying glaring inconsistencies in many noted scholars' evaluations of the existing evidence. In this study, Gordon-Reed assembles a fascinating and convincing argument that the evidence for the affair has been denied a fair hearing.
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Just people
- By Ben on 06-28-20
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The Girl Who Sang to the Buffalo
- A Child, an Elder, and the Light from an Ancient Sky
- By: Kent Nerburn
- Narrated by: Peter Berkrot
- Length: 12 hrs and 55 mins
- Unabridged
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A haunting dream that will not relent pulls author Kent Nerburn back into the hidden world of Native America, where dreams have meaning, animals are teachers, and the "old ones" still have powers beyond our understanding. In this moving narrative, we travel through the lands of the Lakota and the Ojibwe, where we encounter a strange little girl with an unnerving connection to the past, a forgotten asylum that history has tried to hide, and complex, unforgettable characters.
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Thought-provoking, though flawed
- By Buretto on 08-06-18
By: Kent Nerburn
A cherished slice of history
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The historical accuracy
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The details she wrote
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Excellent book and recording
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I enjoyed the story, although a little boring at times, for the most part it was very informative.
The diary itself
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Historical detail
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Informative history
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Insights into 18th C life worth initial profusion of dense detail.
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Insightful and Surprising
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Charming auto biographical journal reading of an American Woman
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