Move To The Capital
In mid-1860, Keckley intended to work as a seamstress in Washington, but lacked the money to pay for the required license as a free black to remain in the city for more than 30 days. Keckley appealed to her patrons, and a Ms. Ringold used her connection to Mayor James G. Berret to petition for a license for Keckley. Berret granted it to her free of charge.
Keckly worked to establish clients and gain enough work to support herself. Commissions for dresses were steadily coming in, but a dress that she completed for Mrs. Robert E. Lee sparked her business's rapid growth. Keckley found most of her work with society women by word-of-mouth recommendations.
Margaret McLean of Maryland, introduced by Varina Davis, requested a dress from Keckley and said she needed it urgently. Keckley declined, as she had heavy order commitments. Mrs. McLean offered to introduce Keckley to "the people in the White House", the newly elected president Abraham Lincoln and his wife. Keckley finished the dress for McLean, who arranged a meeting the following week for her with Mrs. Lincoln.
Read more about this topic: Elizabeth Keckley
Famous quotes containing the words move to, move and/or capital:
“To higher or lower ends, they [the majority of mankind] move too often with something of a sad countenance, with hurried and ignoble gait, becoming, unconsciously, something like thorns, in their anxiety to bear grapes; it being possible for people, in the pursuit of even great ends, to become themselves thin and impoverished in spirit and temper, thus diminishing the sum of perfection in the world, at its very sources.”
—Walter Pater (1839–1894)
“A Man who always acts in the Severity of Wisdom, or the Haughtiness of Quality, seems to move in a personated Part: It looks too Constrained and Theatrical for a Man to be always in that Character which distinguishes him from others.”
—Richard Steele (1672–1729)
“If little faults, proceeding on distemper,
Shall not be winked at, how shall we stretch our eye
When capital crimes, chewed, swallowed, and digested,
Appear before us?”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)