Sarah Ann Leigh

Very little biographical information about her is easy to confirm, but library records identify her as Sarah Ann (Ault) Leigh, born in 1869, and also refer to her as Mrs. Albert Leigh.

She is known for Lace Curtain Cleaning; A Successful Home Business, published in 1913. In that short manual, she explains how she built a business cleaning lace curtains from home, sharing practical advice drawn from real experience rather than theory.

What makes her notable today is the way her book captures a specific kind of self-made working life. It preserves the voice of a woman writing plainly about skill, persistence, and earning an income through home-based labor at a time when such stories were not often recorded in detail.