Elsie Lincoln Benedict

How to Analyze People on Sight Elsie Lincoln Benedict

Elsie Lincoln Benedict (1885-1970) was advertised as the best known women's speaker during the 1920s, speaking to over 3 million people in her lifetime and writing on what Napoleon Hill and Dale Carnegie and a long list of men would do later. She was an American suffragist leader representing the State of Colorado for the Women's Right to Vote. She promoted the law of attraction through her many worldwide lectures.

Elsie first lectured on woman's suffrage under the name Elsie Payne Benedict in Denver, Colorado. Later she owned the Benedict Cottage at Carmel, California, which was rented by her friend, famous evangelist Amiee Semple McPherson.

She drew big audiences here in the pre-World War II decades, discussing a wide variety of subjects from choosing personality colors in clothes to fit the individual, to doing well in marriage and in business. In a 1922 lecture at Scottish Rite Auditorium, she commented, "Most people use less brains in selecting the person with whom they are to spend their lives than they do in choosing an automobile, a bicycle or a cut of steak. Love isn't enough; there must also be understanding."

Elsie was the author of seven books: Famous Lovers (1927); Brainology: Understanding, Developing and Training your Brain, Elsie Lincoln Benedict School of Opportunity (1928); The Spell of the South Seas (1930); Inspirational Poems (1931); Stimulating Stories (1931); Benedictines (1931); So This Is Australia (1932); and Spain Before It Happened (1937); and two with her husband Ralph, How to Analyze People on Sight-The Five Human Types (1921), and Our Trip around the World (1925).

Elsie's husband, Ralph Benedict died in 1941. Devastated by the loss of her husband, Elsie retired from public life. She spent the rest of her life traveling the world and visiting family. She died in San Francisco, California on February 15, 1970. Luigi Kleinsasser's dedicates his 2012 book, "The Book of Life: Find Your Perfect Self, Job, Partner, Life" to the inspiration and research of Elsie Lincoln and Ralph Payne Benedict.