author
Mrs. Lizzie E. Cotton
b. 1845
A practical 19th-century beekeeper from Maine, she wrote with the clear goal of helping ordinary readers make honey production more successful and profitable. Her work stands out for its hands-on confidence and for presenting beekeeping as both a skill and a business.
2 Audiobooks
Bee Keeping for Profit. A New System of Bee Management (1891) Third Edition.
by Mrs. Lizzie E. Cotton
Bee Keeping for Profit. A New System of Bee Management (1880) First Edition.
by Mrs. Lizzie E. Cotton
About the author
Mrs. Lizzie E. Cotton was an American beekeeping writer and hive designer based in West Gorham, Maine. She is best known for Bee Keeping for Profit. A New System of Bee Management, first published in 1880 and later issued in revised editions, including a third edition in 1891.
In her writing, she presents herself as a practical beekeeper drawing on years of experience. Rather than offering a general nature book, Cotton focused on usable advice for managing bees, improving honey production, and making an apiary pay. Her book also promoted her own "Controllable Hive," showing that she was involved not only in writing about beekeeping but in designing equipment and marketing it.
Although detailed biographical records are hard to confirm from the sources found, Cotton's surviving work gives a strong sense of her voice: direct, confident, and businesslike. She remains an interesting figure in American agricultural writing, especially as a woman publishing specialized beekeeping guidance in the late 19th century.