The paper explores various aspects of educational and social opportunities for women in Cincinnati in the mid-19th century. During the early stages of the industrial revolution in the 1830s, women were generally relegated to performing traditional home-based and child-related functions. Although middle and upper-class parents believed in education for their children many schools did not enroll girls until the late 1830s. During the 1840s and 1850s, reformers affirmed female education for various reasons including the need to teach girls their distinctive divisions of responsibility, build character, and enable women to obey the commands of the Bible. Other factors which encouraged educational opportunities for women in the mid-1800s included population increase, economic growth, interest in moral instruction, and a demand for teachers. By the 1860s, sexually segregated classrooms had disappeared, girls performed as well as boys on high school entrance examinations, increasing numbers of female teachers were employed in public schools, and more women pursued careers. By the 1880s, however, there were numerous and often successful efforts by males countervailing feminist demands for equal salary and opportunity. (DB)