The first major biography of the glamorous and scandalous Miriam Leslie, titan of publishing and an unsung hero of womenโs suffrage
Among the fabled tycoons of the Gilded AgeโCarnegie, Rockefeller, Vanderbiltโis a forgotten figure: Mrs. Frank Leslie. For twenty years she ran the countryโs largest publishing company, Frank Leslie Publishing, which chronicled postbellum America in
dozens of weeklies and monthlies. A pioneer in an all-male industry, she made a fortune and became a national celebrity and tastemaker in the process. But Miriam Leslie was also a byword for scandal: She flouted feminine convention, took lovers, married four times,
and harbored unsavory secrets that she concealed through a skein of lies and multiple personas. Both during and after her lifetime, glimpses of the truth emerged, including an illegitimate birth and a checkered youth.
Diamonds and Deadlines reveals the unknown, sensational life of the brilliant and brazen โempress of journalism,โ who dropped a bombshell at her death: She left her entire multimillion-dollar estate to womenโs suffrageโa never-equaled amount that guaranteed
passage of the Nineteenth Amendment. In this dazzling biography, cultural historian Betsy Prioleau draws from diaries, correspondence, genealogies, and published works to provide an intimate look at the life of one of the Gilded Ageโs most complex, powerful women and
unexpected feminist icons. Ultimately, Diamonds and Deadlines restores Mrs. Frank Leslie to her rightful place in history, as a monumental businesswoman who presaged the feminist future and reflected, in bold relief, the Gilded Age, one of the most momentous,
seismic, and vivid epochs in American history.