edith g. peery hoffman

Early Life

Edith Peery Hoffman was born in 1879 at the family homestead of her parents, Hiram and Mary Jane Kimsey Peery, in Dayton, Oregon. Her father, Hiram, had crossed the plains as a teenager with his family in 1863, settling in the Willamette Valley. Her mother, Mary Jane, was the daughter of prominent local farmer and pioneer of 1847, Alvis Kimsey. Edith was one of seven children, including a set of twins, Claude and Amy. Many of her siblings went on to become well-known figures in the Dayton area.

Marriage and Family Life

On June 23, 1901, Edith married Edward Wesley Hoffman, the son of Swiss immigrants who had arrived in the United States in 1851. The Hoffman family lived in Kentucky and Iowa before relocating to the Webfoot area of Dayton in the late 1800s. At the time of their marriage, Edward was 24 and Edith was 23. Over the course of his life, Edward held a number of occupations—working as a farmer, mechanic, barber, and eventually, by 1920, a chiropractor.

The couple welcomed their only child, Eugenia Ethel, in 1905. The family later moved from the Dayton farm to Portland, settling in the Killingsworth neighborhood. By 1920, they were living at 1415 North Michigan Avenue, one block over from their first Portland home on North Mississippi Avenue.

Divorce and Separation

Despite this promising beginning, the marriage did not last. Sometime after the 1920 census, Edith and her teenage daughter Eugenia moved to Medford, Oregon. In January 1924, Edward filed for divorce, claiming that Edith had treated him with persistent cruelty since early in their marriage. He stated she had “entirely without cause or provocation for doing, and against the wishes and desire of the plaintiff, treated the plaintiff in a cruel and inhuman manner, and… subjected him to personal indignities, rendering his life burdensome.” Though it is difficult to know how much truth these accusations held, the court granted Edward the divorce.

Institutionalization and Death

At some point following the separation, Edith was committed to the Oregon State Hospital. Her commitment records have not been located, so the circumstances that led to her institutionalization remain unknown. She died at the hospital the following year, twenty years after her father who also died at the Oregon State Hospital.

The official cause of death was listed as “manic depressive insanity, depressive type”—an early psychiatric term now recognized as a major depressive episode associated with bipolar disorder. Her death certificate indicates that the episode began approximately three months before her death, which occurred at 4:30 a.m. on October 20, 1925. Edith was 46 years old.

A Reflection of the Times

Though the diagnosis may appear clinical, it reflects a time when women’s mental health was poorly understood and often interpreted through the lens of social norms. In the 1920s, women experiencing grief, trauma, or emotional exhaustion—especially after divorce, during menopause, or amid other major life transitions—could easily be labeled as unstable or mentally ill. The psychiatric system of the era offered little room for the emotional realities of women’s lives, and institutionalization could be as much a reflection of social expectations as it was of medical necessity.

It remains unclear whether Edith’s death was natural or the result of suicide. The early morning hour of death, combined with the short duration of her illness and the institutional setting, leaves the question open. Without access to her full medical records, we may never know the precise circumstances.

Legacy

What is certain is that Edith’s story mirrors the broader experiences of many women in early 20th-century Oregon. At a time when societal roles for women were narrow and unforgiving, those who no longer fit within the boundaries of wife or mother could find themselves marginalized—or confined. Diagnoses in that system often carried the weight of moral judgment, and treatment rarely addressed the underlying causes of suffering.

Edith was laid to rest on October 22, 1925, in the Odell Pioneer Cemetery, near several members of the Peery family.