Queer Places:
Wellesley College (Seven Sisters), 106 Central St, Wellesley, MA 02481
Bluff City Cemetery, 945 Bluff City Blvd, Elgin, IL 60120, United States

Louise Marion Bosworth (July 11, 1881 – August 6, 1982) was born on July 11, 1881, in Kane, Illinois, to Alfred Bosworth and Eleanora Maria Wheeler Bosworth. She grew up in Elgin, Kane County, Illinois, alongside her siblings Edith Eleanora, Neil E., Roland Increase, and Winifred Sarah, and spent about thirty years of her early life in the state.

Pursuing higher education, she attended Wellesley College and graduated in 1907. Bosworth built a career as a social worker and social scientist, engaging in pioneering research that helped pave the way for more women to conduct public-interest social science investigations. During her career, she worked for a number of settlement houses and served as a researcher at the Women's Educational and Industrial Union (WEIU). Through her work, she extensively surveyed working women to examine their labor, housing, and financial realities.

Between 1907 and 1909, Bosworth participated in the WEIU survey analyzing the incomes and expenditures of women workers, which led to her publishing the study The Living Wage of Women Workers. In 1911, she conducted a survey examining available housing in Philadelphia, subsequently publishing her findings in Housing Conditions in Main Line Towns. Later, in 1914, she carried out an investigation into living costs under the auspices of the Survey Committee of the Cleveland Foundation.

Her life and archival materials have been noted in research guides addressing LGBTQ history, such as those provided by the Schlesinger Library at Harvard. In her later years, she resided in Judea and New Preston in Litchfield County, Connecticut. Louise Marion Bosworth passed away on August 6, 1982, at the age of 101, and was buried at Bluff City Cemetery in Elgin, Illinois.

References:

In Adamless Eden: The Community of Women Faculty at Wellesley by Patricia Ann Palmieri

Other references:

• Louise Bosworth Papers (1890–1946): Held at the Schlesinger Library on the History of Women in America at the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study, Harvard University. This collection includes personal account books, field research, notes, and correspondence related to her sociological work and career.
• Harvard Library Research Guides: Included in the Schlesinger Library’s specialized subject guide on LGBTQ History, which references her papers and archival records.
• Bosworth, Louise Marion (1911): The Living Wage of Women Workers: A Study of Incomes and Expenditures of 450 Women in the City of Boston. Department of Research, Women's Educational and Industrial Union (WEIU); edited with an introduction by F. Spencer Baldwin (New York: Longmans, Green, & Co.).
• Bosworth, Louise Marion (1911): Housing Conditions in Main Line Towns (Survey of available housing in Main Line, Philadelphia).
• Bosworth, Louise Marion (1914): Investigation of Living Costs, conducted under the auspices of the Survey Committee of the Cleveland Foundation.
• Harvard University Library Open Collections Program: Women Working, 1800–1930 feature on Louise Marion Bosworth.
• Internet Archive: Digitized copies of her primary published research, including The Living Wage of Women Workers.
• Genealogical & Cemetery Records: Public genealogical databases (such as FamilySearch and Find a Grave) for census listings, family history records (Kane County, Illinois, and Litchfield County, Connecticut), and interment records at Bluff City Cemetery in Elgin, Illinois.

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