Rebecca Ellen Robinson Weatherford - Manufacturer of Hair Jewelry of Every Style and Variety - Salem, OR.

Meet Rebecca Ellen Robinson Weatherford
1843 - 1892

By the mid-19th century (even before the death of Prince Albert and the onset of the American Civil War), hairwork jewelry had become so popular that American women were already flooding into the once-male-dominated, now booming commercial trade.

A few decades later, Rebecca Ellen Robinson Weatherford of Salem, Oregon was making her mark on the profession. Her story serves as a perfect case study in the realities of women’s labor in the 19th century.

In the 1880 Salem City Directory, Rebecca was advertised as 'Mrs. J.W. Weatherford - Manufacturer of Hair Jewelry of Every Style and Variety.' The listing praised her elegance, neatness, and artistic skill, noting that her work compared favorably to anything made anywhere else in the country.

Yet there was quite a significant discrepancy in the census of that same year, which listed her occupation simply as 'Keeping House.'

It wasn't enough that she had to do business under her husband’s name, but this designation in the official record further exemplifies how historically women’s professional and economic contributions have been erased by defaulting them to their marital and domestic status. This also makes researching the history of women and their accomplishments particularly challenging. 

Nevertheless, for Rebecca, hairwork was a lifeline.

By 1883, her husband had defaulted on debts, abandoned the family for San Francisco, ignored her letters, and even published notices in the local paper forbidding merchants from extending her credit.

But because of the economic security hairwork provided, Rebecca was able to see her way out of this situation, in a time when many women had no way of escaping unhappy or even abusive marriages.

She successfully petitioned for divorce, was granted full custody of her children, Fredrick, Ina, and Pearl, and retained sole ownership of her property and business at what is now the northwest corner of Commercial and Center Streets in downtown Salem, Oregon.

Rebecca went on to remarry some years later, but died of cancer in 1892 at the age of 49. Today, she is buried at the Salem Pioneer Cemetery, one of the oldest burial grounds in Oregon.

Her story is an empowering and important reminder of how some women were able to rely on historic craft traditions to secure autonomy and financial independence, even when official records contradict the true reality of their labor, talents, and economic successes.



© 2025 Diane Irby. This content may not be copied or distributed without written permission from the author. If you would like to share about this archival discovery and the analytical insights in this essay in your own work, writing, or social media posts, please attribute properly.

I do not own the copyright to all of the photos or images used in my educational materials. My use of potentially copyrighted content falls under Fair Use guidelines for the purpose of education, as outlined in Section 107 of the Copyright Act. Additionally, I have curated and annotated these collections of images in order to provide and present my own research-led analysis and scholarly synthesis, which is protected under copyright law as my intellectual property.

Bibliography
Find a Grave, s.v. “Rebecca Ellen Robinson Weatherford,” Memorial No. 249218270, https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/249218270/rebecca_ellen-weatherford.

Salem City Directory for 1880. Salem, OR, 1880. Advertisement for Mrs. J.W. [Rebecca Ellen Robinson] Weatherford, Manufacturer of Hair Jewelry.

U.S. Bureau of the Census, Tenth Census of the United States, 1880, Salem, Marion County, Oregon, population schedule, 131 Commercial St. SE, entry for R.E. Weatherford.