
Eliza Lucas Pinckney
planter | entrepreneur
Look at your blue jeans ~ the design may have come from Joe's, but the color can be credited to the little-known Eliza Pinckney, an entrepreneur ahead of her time.
As a teenager, Eliza experimented with indigo cultivation in marshy colonial South Carolina. Indigo was historically expensive to grow and produce, but Eliza's pioneering work made dye affordable. It also provided the colony with a new cash crop...showing how innovative women have always been central to the US economy.
Sons Charles + Thomas absorbed her spirit of independence. They both played important roles in the American Revolution and early US government.
indigo | cultivating seeds to produce high-quality blue dye...the essence of blue jeans
growing the economy | her experiments as a teenager sparked thriving businesses for struggling planters
being a respected businesswoman | George Washington was among the pallbearers at her funeral in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
1739 | when 16 years old, took over running the family's 3 plantations
1754 | South Carolina exported 1 million pounds of indigo
1989 | first woman inducted in the South Carolina Business Hall of Fame
from | to
teenage plantation exec | catalyst for a still-thriving industry
born on
December 28, 1722
born in
Antigua, British West Indies
~ Cabbage Tree, one of her family's sugar plantations ~
birth name
Elizabeth Lucas
studied at
boarding school in London
loved studying
botany
grew up in
South Carolina
daughter of
Ann Mildrum Lucas + Lieutenant Colonel George Lucas
sister of
2 brothers | Thomas + George
1 sister | Mary {called Polly}
married to
Charles Pinckney
~ a nearby planter | married on May 27, 1744 at age 22 ~
~ Charles was a widow whose previous wife was Eliza's friend + mentor ~
mother of
3 sons | Charles, Thomas + George {who died}
1 daughter | Harriott
died on
May 26, 1793
~ from cancer ~
image credits
Edward Greene Malbone | Gibbes Museum of Art | public domain
gitane | Wikimedia Commons | CC A 3.0
collapse bio bits"I have the business of 3 plantations to transact which requires much writing and more business and fatigue of other sorts than you can imagine, but lest you should imagine it too burthensome to a girl at my early time of life give me leave to assure you I think myself happy."
To my good friend Mrs. Boddicott in England | may 1740
"I am sorry we lost this season. We can do nothing towards it now but make the works ready for next year."
to her father | june 1741
"What ever contributes to health and pleasure of mind must also contribute to good looks."
letter to Mary Bartlett | january 1742
"The longer time we are awake, the longer we live . . . thus then I have the advantage of the sleepers in point of long life."
to Mary Bartlett | january 1742
"I beg leave here to acknowledge particularly my obligation to you for . . . my Education, which I esteem a more valueable fortune than any you could now have given me."
to her father, Governor Lucas | may 1744
"A variety of imployment gives my thoughts a relief from melloncholy subjects, tho' 'tis but a temporary one."
to Mr. Morley, family friend | march 1760
"I love a Garden and a book; and they are all my amusement except I include one of the greatest Businesses of my life (my attention to my dear little girl) under that article."
to Mr. Keate, a family friend in England | february 1762
"Nor can I take a penny from his young helpless family. Independence is all I wish, and a little will make us that."
to her son Thomas | may 1779
for further reading about Eliza Lucas Pinckney:
curated with care by Meghan Miller Brawley {july 2014}
Indigofera tinctoria
The indigo plant. When Eliza married Charles Pinckney in 1744, her father gave him "all the indigo then upon the ground" as a dowry.
Karl Stüber | CC BY-SA 3.0