In my previous post, I wrote about visiting the historic marker for suffragist Edith Ainge, located at the corner of 4th and Pine in Jamestown, New York. From there I walked down the hill to 2nd Street. There I found Allen's Opera House that opened in 1881 and is
now the Lucille Ball Little Theatre, a community arts live theatre. Two markers are next to the building—one for Lucille Ball, “Queen of Comedy,” the first of several landmarks for her, including one “Scary” and one “New” that I’ll write about in my next post.
The other marker commemorates the Chautauqua County Political Equality Club (CCPEC).
News of the CCPEC’s founding on November 12, 1887, was reported in The Woman’s Tribune, a newspaper with
the slogan “Equality Before the Law,” published in Beatrice, Nebraska. Clara Bewick Colby, founder, writer, copyeditor, occasional typesetter, and constant fundraiser, had ties to suffragists in the east; She extended their influence by publishing their letters, articles, and news of their activities. As you can see in the image, the marker highlights the meeting on October 31, 1888. In fact, a particularly noteworthy meeting was held on August 10, 1888. Noteworthy because Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony spoke at that meeting. Individually they had visit Jamestown many time, but this was their first joint appearance.
Ellen A. Martin, a lawyer who lived in Illinois was one of the many women who attended the August meeting. She recounted her experience in a letter that appeared in In the August 13 edition of The Woman’s Tribune— Dear Tribune, Martin wrote, I just spent a vacation of several weeks in Western New York and have been much impressed by the vigorous conditions of the suffrage cause there. It was my fortune to be present at the suffrage meeting held in Jamestown, my old home, August 10th, and addressed by Mrs. Stanton and Miss Anthony.
Ellen Martin heralded Stanton and Anthony as "great women . . .one a great exponent of suffrage principles; the other the commander in chief in the field." While doing research for my book The Vote: Women's Fierce Fight, I was struck by suffragists' frequent use of military language such as "commander in chief" (See note below for more about Ellen Martin.)
The women's activism clearly agitated someone for a newspaper article appeared in a newspaper, decrying "the meeting of ladies who think they ought to be allowed to vote. . . It is no use, ladies; some one has got to stay at home with the babies . . . .So you just tend to your knitting and let the men tend to the election just as they always have done."
I contined my walk along Second Street to Main Street. Still standing at the corner was the Fenton Building where my father, a psychiatrist had his office. (We lived 20 miles south in North Warren, Pennsylvania, where my father had previously worked at the Warren State Hospital.) During my college years, I worked in my father's office. We would eat lunch at a restaurant across the street—Liscandra's. I was amazed to see it was still in business! (We ate breakfast there: I told our waiter that I had eaten there in the 1960s. She replied,"I waited tables here for years, but now I am a co-owner with my husband.)
I headed back to our hotel. Walking up Main Street passing one more landmark—the Lucille Desi Arnaz Museum, at the corner of Main and 3rd Street. It was close, so I took some pictures and continued on my way, eager to tell Linda about my fruitful excursion. Tomorrow we would find "Scary" and "New" Lucy, start the search for a missing marker, and have an other worldly encounter.
Note: On election day in 1891, in Lombard, Illinois, 14 women led by Ellen A. Martin went to the polling place. They were eligible to vote because the local voter qualifications rules did not include gender, they told the three election judges. One judge had a spasm, the other leaned against a tree, the third judge fell backwards into the flour barrel. Ellen Martin became the first woman to vote in Illinois. City officials changed the rules for subsequent elections.
Newspaper articles:
"Jamestown," The Buffalo Commercial," August 13, 1888, p. 4
"The Political Equality Club of Jamestown," The Buffalo Times, August 16,1888, p. 2.
(FYI: Buffalo, New York, is 90 miles north of Jamestown.)
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