Under the Civil War pension act of 1862, the widow of a Union Army soldier was entitled to a pension if her husband died as a direct result of his military service; however, she lost her right to the pension if she remarried. I analyze the effect this had on the rate of remarriage among these...

We present new findings about the relationship between marriage and socioeconomic background in the United States in the late 19th and early 20th Centuries. Imputing socioeconomic status of family of origin from first names, we document a socioeconomic gradient for women in the probability of...