 I'm Amy Blossom from Jackson County Library Services, and I welcome you to Windows in Time. Windows in Time is a series of local history talks, a program that's been developed by the Jackson County Library Services and Southern Oregon Historical Society. It is also part of the Southern Oregon History Show, which airs on Thursday nights at 6 p.m. You can also see us live, though, at the Medford and Ashland Libraries, the first and second Wednesday of each month, at noon. So are you ready for some history? Let's go! When I taught at Southern Oregon University of American History, I used to ask students a couple of questions. I actually told them there were a couple of things I didn't really understand about American history, as much as I'd studied it. One of them was, I didn't understand why it took women so long to get the vote in America, 70 years longer than it took others, and it was 70 years after African-American males had been given the voter with the 15th Amendment. So I was always curious about why that process took so long. The other thing that I never, I said I never really could get my head around as a history instructor was, how in the world did prohibition ever pass in the first place? What that really means is that freedom-loving people, which Americans are, were willing to give up a private right, and I found that kind of odd. And so I understand mechanically how it happened, but I always was curious about those two questions. And then thirdly, I was particularly curious, what was it like in Southern Oregon regarding both the women's vote and prohibition? And so I did some research on that, and that's the basis of my talk, which is saloons and suffrage in Southern Oregon. So some people attribute the suffrage for women, the vote for women, to the fact that there was a kind of pioneer spirit. Because if you look at a map, you'll see that the women get the vote in many of the Western states, but very reluctantly in the South and in the East. So some people attribute it to that. The slide that you are looking at now with Wyoming, very early, Utah, Colorado, Idaho, Washington, California. Obviously all these states, Western states, as we think of them, granted the vote very early to women. But how do we account for Oregon's vote for women? Here is a rundown on this particular slide showing you the first attempt was in 1884, and it was defeated by 72%. In 1900, it was defeated. 1908, it was defeated. 1910, it was defeated. And in 1912, finally, Oregon granted the vote to women with 52% approval. So I'm not sure a pioneer spirit actually explains Oregon's voting record. This is the most defeats of women's vote anywhere in the United States, was actually here in Oregon. So apparently these little campaign pens that you see, that say no on suffrage were pretty effective, at least in the immediate area. Now there are some other things that come from this period. There are some very certainly famous situations, well-known to historians, but also well-known to any general reader of American history. Probably a lot of people know that Susan B. Anthony came here in 1871, and she actually went to Roseburg. She went to Jacksonville, and she was an advocate, as everybody knows, for women's suffrage. But there were some interesting quotes from some of the men who encountered her on this particular trip. As they say, it was as though the coming of the circus had been announced. We will checkmate you with a free supper and a free dance, a Roseburg saloon keeper said, because he thought that would cancel anybody going to Susan's speech. Another response from the Roseburg Plain Dealer editor, she has the gift that all married men are compelled to admit has been given to women, a fluent tongue, but of politics, law and logic, she is ignorant as a child. And then finally, a Jacksonville response, she possesses not the most distant approach to beauty, her message accompanied but little, accomplished but little, but for the advancement of the cause. That was the editor of the Democratic Times in Jacksonville. So this 1871 appearance has actually been shown as an example of the hostility towards a women's vote in Oregon, probably unfairly as we'll talk about that. Susan B. Anthony joined Abigail Scott Dunaway, who invited her to Oregon to fight for the cause. Dunaway is probably our equivalent, Oregon's equivalent to Susan B. Anthony was very instrumental in all those early votes in trying to bring this to a head. Unfortunately though, when she went to Jacksonville at one point, she was egged and hung in effigy and burned in Jacksonville, just her effigy, not her, in 1879. And she was, that episode is written about a great deal, that one and the rejection of Susan B. Anthony. And so it, you get the impression, if you didn't know any better, the Southern Oregon is very hostile towards women's vote. Her, these were called Jacksonville arguments, in fact, these eggs that were thrown at Susan, and particularly at Abigail Scott. Abigail said, only one egg hit us and it was fresh and sweet. And it took the, it took it square on the scalp and saved us a shampooing bill. After this, they both ended up at the Culver House in Talent, where they were received more friendly. So, if, if, is there a connection here? Does the vote in, for women in Oregon equal Oregon going dry earlier than the rest? And it has not occurred in other suffrage states, was the argument. An argument that was used against the women's vote was the idea that they would, of course, vote for prohibition. They just assumed that. But you can see the power of the women's vote reflected in this particular slide. In 1912, 144,000 voters, but by 1914, with the women able to now vote, there's 260,000 women voters. So it does change politics in a significant way. However, many of the southern Oregon towns had already gone dry before the women's vote. And Abigail, done away, totally disagreed. She said that it was not, it was not prohibition, that was the problem, it wasn't the abuse of alcohol, that was the problem, it was the lack of the right to vote. What women need is not arbitrary laws for the coercion of men but liberty for themselves. They are taxed without representation and governed without consent. The classic argument, constitutional argument. Women are not proposing to govern men. We are seeking his, we are not seeking, we are seeking to govern ourselves, not other men. We could not rule men if we would, and would not if we could. Prohibition binds equal suffrage liberates. And so she, she continued that opposition to prohibition throughout her campaign and throughout her years as a suffragette. So sometimes I think there's the assumption that there's this direct linkage and not always the case. Her argument was that the best strategy is what she called the still hunt. And that is where you work behind the scenes with prominent men and you try to convince them to put issues on the ballot. And as you saw, she put a lot of issues on the ballot over a five year or over a many year period. She ran five different proposals. She believed in suffrage first. Supporters of prohibition are ruining any chance of suffrage success, she said. So take one issue at a time. Don't try to overdo. Now, Oregon was pretty open on the saloon laws up all the way through its history. In 1887, statewide prohibition was defeated. Saloons were allowed to operate. A local option was very common in Oregon. And the only problem with local option was that some communities would be wet and some would be dry. Well, that meant that there were actually special trains that were sometimes run between Grants Pass and Ashland, depending on who was dry and who was wet at that particular time, so that people could get their alcohol. In 1908, 23 counties out of 34 were dry. And that's half the population. So this is all before the women's vote now, or the granting of the women's vote in 1912. 1914 statewide prohibition does win 58% voter approval and it was enacted eventually in 1916. So the state of Oregon is way ahead on both prohibition, legislation, and votes for women. What this all means is that 900 Oregon saloons and 18 breweries in 98 towns had to close because of prohibition. Now, there were dry states before the national amendment, the 18th amendment in 1919. Oklahoma missed all these states. And if you notice, they're heavily concentrated. They tend to be heavily concentrated in the southern states that were dry. And a number of people attribute a strong religious flavor to that, which there is to prohibition in general. But you can see a variety of states have gone dry even before the 18th amendment. There's a religious appeal of the Women's Christian Temperance Union, which was very, very strong in all the southern Oregon communities. And I find this kind of an interesting ad that you have in front of you. It says, am I my brother's keeper? And today, I suspect the answer would be, well, no. But in those days, the answer was yes. Overwhelmingly, you are your brother's keeper, which means you better darn well vote to abolish alcohol. That's an Oregon ad, by the way. Prohibition campaign pens, the thing is that every woman knew a friend who was helpless or saddled with a hard drinking husband. And so the emphasis on women logically voting for prohibition was often made. And the appeals of prohibition were the home. The home versus the saloon. And you have a couple of postcards here that show that very emphasis with little kids. Little kids were always on the prohibition buttons showing that do this for my sake. And you see the one on the left here in red, vote no for my sake. Please vote dry for me. These were prohibition appeals and they were a heavy emphasis on women and those homemakers and their children. Now, there was another answer. This was an interesting answer. And this is a fella in Portland, Simon Benson, who was very successful in the lumber business. And he was a timber baron. And he gave $10,000 for Portland to install bronze drinking fountains. And his assumption was these are called bubblers. And they're called Benson's bubblers. And the whole idea was that people, if these were strategically placed around town, instead of going to the tavern at noon, they would go get a drink of water out of the bubbler. There actually were a number of them built throughout in 1912 were built throughout Portland. The equivalency to what he donated for that today, that $10,000 today in today's dollars would be the equivalent of $240,000. It would be over a quarter million dollars that he felt so strongly. There are still 52 of these bubblers left. So if you want to go around Portland and see what you could find, you will in fact find these. Local choice was really the most popular position. It's a reasonable position. Why not just let each community decide whether they want to have prohibition or not. And then the next level down is the local towns. You have counties that might have certain restrictions, but should the town be able to choose for itself? And in fact, that's exactly what happened for a period of time. And it was encouraged and some towns would ban it and other towns would not. So it was a real checkerboard as to where you could drink and where you couldn't. All of this before national prohibition. There actually was a local option liquor law passed at the state level which allowed saloons and gave this chance to people to make their own calls. And there's another side to this. And that is that besides alcohol and the women's vote issue, which are kind of intertwined here, or at least I'm trying to explain it kind of intertwined. A number of men did not believe that women belonged in politics. They believed that politics was dirty. It was filthy. It was crooked. And they really were kind of paternalistic, I suppose you could say, but they were trying to in fact protect women from the evils of politics. So there was a lot of emphasis on not allowing the vote. But by 1912, there is a new style of campaign. Abigail's gotten old, frankly. And she's ill. And there are problems with her health. And she sits out the 1912 campaign, which if you remember back to my chart is the only one that passes. All the others had failed up to that point. In 1912, she brought in national speakers. She didn't, but those who are now the younger versions brought in national speakers, they use mass advertising, paid newspaper ads, testimonials. They form suffrage clubs. And there were even in Portland, there was even an African American women's separate club because they were segregated at that time. Posters, handbills, leaflets, campaign pens, votes for women's ribbons, parades, theater presentations. There were mass meetings, debates, factory lunch meetings. And there were suffrage picnics that serve suffrage pie and suffrage coffee. So you got that if you were in favor of suffrage. There was even a very interesting play put on in Klamath Falls where the men dressed in drag at a ball to encourage somehow encourage the celebration of women's suffrage. So it was a different kind of campaign than Abigail had run. This was not the still hunt where you just worked with the most effective men, the most powerful men at the top levels. And it worked. The 1912 it passed with 52%. One of the approaches was a postcard like I have up now which said you send this to your friends and it's like a chain letter. And that in fact you say you're voting for that particular person and as a result you're voting for that particular initiative and then others will vote for it as well. And then there was the biblical reference from an Oregonian cartoon which shows Washington and California and Idaho all have women's suffrage before Oregon. And the comment is it's not good that men should be by themselves. And this is kind of a biblical reference but it's also an attempt to shame men into voting for suffrage. There are a couple other attempts at that same thing. This is a 1911 California poster that was used in the 1912 Oregon campaign. They traded back and forth. They used each other's tactics and arguments. That's what the new younger women brought to the campaign was a kind of a modern approach to things. Here are some other approaches that they used to shame male voters in 1912. Women can vote on equal terms with men in Wyoming, Utah, Idaho, Colorado, Washington, California. Why not in Oregon? And then you see a map on the other side which is actually was a postcard and it says Oh, Oregon. Can't we fill the gap? And because we're the only state that were surrounded by states in fact that have voted for women's vote. So it's a very sophisticated campaign, actually kind of very modern campaign like we might see today and this was 100 years ago. Now, okay, one of my other questions, the third question I had was what's going on in Southern Oregon? What's Southern Oregon all about? First of all, I'm now beginning to understand why after all this research, beginning to understand how the women's vote took so long, but I'm also beginning to understand how prohibition occurred. But I'm still curious about Southern Oregon. And so here's an example. And if you notice on this map of Oregon, you will see Southern Oregon, every county voted yes for women's suffrage. So don't be sort of bamboozled by those early reports of Susan B. Anthony and Abigail being egged in Jacksonville or being criticized early on because in fact when push came to shove Southern Oregon is right there voting as well. Southern Oregon's progressive on both saloons and suffrage I found out. Here's a whole list I put on a slide of the various things that were happening during that time. All this is happening before the national legislation. And in both cases, both regarding saloons and suffrage, Southern Oregon is well ahead. Ashland was kind of a hotbed of the Women's Christian Temperance Association. And those folks also were big advocates there. But so they were organized in all the communities around here, talent. Phoenix had organizations, Medford had organizations, all kinds of speeches and debates. I just went a little too far. This next slide is a Medford debate, a suffrage debate, and CEO Whistler of Medford will debate the proposed Women's Suffrage Amendment with Professor St. John R. H. Burns and Bert Greer. And it will be officiated or refereed, they say, by a judge. And it's going to be at Memorial Hall in Medford. The only problem is the fellow that was supposed to oppose Women's Suffrage was a no-show. So the men simply gave their speeches and went home. But there were, in both Ashland and Medford, there were people who opposed these various things. In fact, a byline written by a woman in Ashland, why I'm opposed to equal suffrage. And it was quite a lengthy piece that she wrote. In fact, this particular woman was also in the voters pamphlet, early voters pamphlet, she was one of the authors of the arguments against suffrage. So we don't want to get the impression that everybody went down the line together. And there was also opposition in Medford and fairly articulate opposition from women, not just men. But it's a 52% victory. And at last, the congratulations are sent from Roseburg of all places to Abigail for her success. Maybe that's making up for the things that were said about her way back in the 1800s. And this is, on the right, you'll see Dunaway's actual voter registration card, which was something she was very, very proud of. And this is a classic picture of Oregon's Governor West, who was a big supporter, by the way. In fact, he heard, he was a young boy, and he heard her speak. He was just 10 years old, I think. And he heard her speak at a rally as a young boy. And she asked the question, why shouldn't your mother be able to vote if those drunkards that come out of the taverns and saloons can? And he thought, she's right. And he supported women's suffrage as much as he could as governor. And here he is, her writing the proclamation in the governor's office. And he honored her because it had been Abigail had spent most of her life, frankly. What's interesting, another odd twist in all this, and this is what's the fun about doing these kind of local history looks at things, is you find things that are odd. For example, her Abigail's brother, Harvey Scott, was the editor of the Oregonian. And he was against women's suffrage. And his sister, for all those years, was fighting for it. And of course, obviously, they disagreed a great deal. But he died in 1910. And no longer was writing negative editorials anymore, obviously. Meanwhile, Abigail was too ill to participate in the 1912 campaign. And that younger set that was very much very modern in terms of how they ran the campaign were successful. And I suppose in a way you could say the fact that Harvey and Abigail were gone may have attributed somewhat to the success. Now, the Oregonian women did not stop. They went on to Washington, D.C., and they fought for national suffrage, along with the other women from the Western states that already had suffrage. And a number of them were arrested. Oregon women who were arrested in D.C. for protesting in 1917 included a number of people, Alice and Betty Graham, Louise Brandt, and Clara Wold. And they were imprisoned as far as this protest. It's so hard to imagine that you could be imprisoned today in Washington, D.C., for advocating the right to a vote. There is plenty of opportunity for anybody who's interested in this topic for further research. And so what I did was put together some slides that has the names of all the prominent suffragettes in Southern Oregon. And so the first slide contains those women in Ashland and those women in Rogue River who were instrumental in fighting for the women's vote. Also Medford, Jacksonville, Phoenix, and the major women who were involved again in this fight are on those slides. If you notice, this is extensive. This is every city in Southern Oregon that has major suffragette movement going on. Now, maybe some of you can help if you ever get a chance to respond to this presentation. We can't seem to find good suffrage pictures, pictures of women where we clearly know they're involved in a demonstration. So my question here with this particular slide is this a suffrage photo? A number of people think it is. And they are right marching around the plaza in downtown Ashland. But we can't, I've tried to enhance this picture and we can't read their placards. If we could, we'd know probably what they were marching for. And we have another picture that's much clearer and this also is in Ashland. And the question is what are they marching for? Is this a suffrage march or is this a fort to create a dry town? And it may be that it is a dry town. It may be the women's Christian Temperance Union because they're all carrying umbrellas and they're all dressed alike. And it simply may reflect the fact that the symbol for those who were in favor of prohibition was the umbrella because it was dry. So we're not really sure if either one of these are pictures. It would be fascinating if people did have pictures of the of the movements. We do know the results and the results are that women can vote. In fact, there are more women voters than male voters in the United States today. The first woman elected to Congress was from Montana, Jeanette Rankin. She's an interesting woman, another one of these interesting twists. She was there elected to vote against World War One, our American entry into World War One, which was a pretty popular movement. She was elected later by 1940 to Congress for a second time and this time she also opposed the United States entry into World War Two, which was pretty gutsy at that time because of the enthusiasm in light of everything that was happening, especially after Pearl Harbor. And we also know that if we're 21 years old, we can buy alcohol in many places, but not every place. And there are places that still are dry counties and so it isn't everywhere, but nevertheless it's mostly there. So thank you for coming and joining us this evening. And open your eyes, remember history is everywhere.