Winnie Woodfern Comes Out in Print: Story-Paper Authorship and Protolesbian Self-Representation in Antebellum America.

The article examines the relationship between female masculinity and romantic friendship in the works of newspaper writer Mary Field Williams Gibson, also known as Winnie Woodfern. According to the author, Gibson's contributions to the 19th-century periodicals known as story-papers challenged normative gender roles and practices. Particular focus is given to the role of Gibson's personal experiences of courtship, marriage, domesticity, and romantic female friendship in her writings. Details on Gibson's literary career and her marriage to engineer Alonzo Lewis are presented. Other topics include death, violence, lesbian self-representation, and authors Louisa May Alcott and Fanny Fern.