Folders are arranged alphabetically by name of the organization that created the handbill or event.
On June 24th, 1919, Pennsylvania became the seventh state to ratify the Nineteenth Amendment securing the right for women to vote. The women's suffrage movement in Pennsylvania was heavily influenced by Quaker ideologies and can be traced back to abolitionist movements, namely the Philadelphia Female Anti-Slavery Society founded by Lucretia Mott in 1833 that also advocated for women's rights. By 1866, the Equal Rights Association of Philadelphia was advocating not only for African Americans but also for women's suffrage. The Pennsylvania Woman Suffrage Association was founded in 1869 in Philadelphia with Mary Grew serving as its first president. At their first meeting in 1870, they declared their affiliation with the American Woman Suffrage Association, which later merged with the National Woman Suffrage Association and became the National American Woman Suffrage Association (NAWSA).
The first women's suffrage demonstration was held in Philadelphia in 1914, at which time suffragists were attempting to pass a law through the Pennsylvania state legislature to allow women the right to vote but it was defeated by referendum in 1915. During this campaign, Jennie Bradley Roessing, the head of the Pennsylvania Woman Suffrage Association and later the NAWSA, led the state tour of the Liberty Bell of Suffrage that went to every county for woman's suffrage. After the passage of the Nineteenth Amendment, the NAWSA turned into the League of Women's Voters that is still active today.
While the original owner of these handbills, photographs, and assorted other items related to Woman's Suffrage in Pennsylvania is unknown, it is likely that the individual had some involvement with the Equal Franchise Society of Philadelphia. Evidence of this consists of the numerous "rubber stamps" containing the name of the organization and the existence of a group of pages from a notebook that appears to have been used as an address book for various woman suffrage organizations in Pennsylvania.
Purchased from Tomberg Rare Books of Windermere, Florida in December of 2021.
Woman's Suffrage Movement in Pennsylvania Collection, c.1914-1918, AIS.2021.13, Archives and Special Collections, University of Pittsburgh Library System
Processed by Brooke Liveringhouse, September 2023.
Jennie Bradley Roessing Papers, 1887-1962, AIS.1964.24, Archives & Special Collections, University of Pittsburgh Library System
The Woman's Suffrage Movement in Pennsylvania Collection includes twenty-seven items, ranging from small handbills and information leaflets to photographs that promote the Woman's Suffrage Movement throughout Pennsylvania, and is particularly well focused on the election of November 1914. Also included are two handbills produced by the Pennsylvania Association Opposed to Woman Suffrage.
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