Isabella Beeton

She was born Isabella Mayson on March 14, 1836 in Marylebone, London, the eldest of three daughters to Benjamin Mayson, a linen factor merchant and his wife Elizabeth 

Shortly after Isabella's birth the family moved to Milk Street, Cheapside, from where Benjamin traded.  He died when Isabella was four years old. 

Three years after Benjamin's death, Elizabeth married Henry Dorling, a widower with four children. Henry was the Clerk of Epsom Racecourse, and lived within the racecourse grounds. 

Over the next twenty years Henry and Elizabeth had a further thirteen children. Isabella was instrumental in her siblings' upbringing, and the experience gave her much insight and experience in how to manage a family and its household.

During her youth, she studied in Germany and excelled as a pianist.

Isabella Beeton, née Mayson, photographed in about 1854

Isabella Beeton married Samuel Orchart Beeton, an ambitious publisher and magazine editor, in July 1856. 

Less than a year later, she began writing for one of his publications, The Englishwoman's Domestic Magazine. Beeton translated French fiction and wrote the cookery column, though all the recipes were plagiarized from other works, or sent in by the magazine's readers. 

In 1859 the Beetons launched a series of 48-page monthly supplements to the magazine; the 24 instalments were published in one volume as Mrs Beeton's Book of Household Management in October 1861. Published to great acclaim, it sold 60,000 copies in the first year and by 1968 had sold nearly 2 million copies. 

Costing 7s 6d, Mrs Beeton's Book of Household Management contained recipes, diet and menu plans and practical advice on running a home. Isabella's Beeton's ground breaking book made her a household name.

Title page of Mrs Beeton's Book of Household Management, 

The earliest use of the word 'tinned' to refer to food given by the Oxford English Dictionary is an 1861 reference by Mrs Beeton to "tinned turtle."

Her short life was marred by tragedy. She gave birth to four children, two of whom died in infancy, and had several miscarriages.

Isabella Beeton was just 28 when she died of puerperal fever after giving birth to her fourth child. 

Two of her biographers posit the theory that Samuel had unknowingly contracted syphilis in a premarital liaison with a prostitute, and had passed the condition on to his wife during their honeymoon.