Wendy Moore

Author and journalist Wendy Moore will be lifting the lift on a Lichfield man’s attempts to ‘train’ the perfect wife.

The story of Thomas Day will be brought to life in a talk at Erasmus Darwin House on May 23.

Day’s ‘training scheme’ saw him adopt two orphan girls in a bid to educate them to become the meek, docile women he considered marriage material.

Wendy Moore
Wendy Moore

A spokesperson added: “Unsurprisingly, his plans did not run smoothly.

“Having returned one orphan early on, his girl of choice, Sabrina Sidney, would also fall foul of the experiment.

“From then on, she led a difficult life, inhabiting a curious half-world – an ex-orphan, and not quite a ward; a governess, and not quite a fiancée.

“But Sabrina also ended up figuring in the life of scientists and luminaries as disparate as Erasmus Darwin and Joseph Priestley, as well as that pioneering generation of women writers who included Fanny Burney, Maria Edgeworth and Anna Seward.

“In her book How to Create the Perfect Wife, Wendy has found a story that echoes her concerns about women’s historic powerlessness, and captures a moment when ideas of human development and child rearing underwent radical change.”

The talk will take place at 6.30pm and tickets are now available at the museum, priced at £6.

For more information call 01543 306260 or [email protected].

Founder of Lichfield Live and editor of the site.