S02 E14 Missouri: The Music Beneath the March

In this episode, Cynthia Holmes and Elyssa Ford discuss the suffrage battle at sites in Missouri. 

• Virginia and Francis Minor were a St. Louis power couple determined to get votes for women and took their case all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court, which decided citizenship did not mean the right to vote. 
• Anna Holland Jones was an African American activist who in August 1915 wrote an article entitled, “Woman Suffrage and Social Reform” in which she asked the question, why should a woman “not have the legal means – the ballot – to widen and deepen her work?”
• Alma Nash and the Missouri Women’s Military Band energetically supported women’s suffrage and travelled to Washington D.C. for the 1913 parade and were moved to the lead to open the way for marchers.  
• The Golden Lane Parade in 1916 saw 7,000 women lining the streets of St. Louis during the Democratic National Convention and silently staring-down the delegates as they walked from their hotels to the convention to illustrate how women had been silenced by the continued denial of the vote. 

About our Guests

   Cynthia Holmes is an attorney in St. Louis serving families and small businesses and is the State Coordinator for the National Votes for Women Trail. 

   Dr. Elyssa Ford is a professor of history at Northwest Missouri State University. She is a scholar of gender and sexuality with a focus on the West. Her first book Rodeo as Refuge, Rodeo as Rebellion: Gender, Race, and Identity in the American Rodeo looks at race- and group-specific rodeos across the US, and her second book Slapping Leather: Queer Cowfolx at the Gay Rodeo traces the history of gay rodeo in the United States as a site of queer activism and contestation. As a public historian, she is committed to local history and has written extensively on the Midwest and Northwest Missouri, including an article on women’s suffrage for the National Park Service.

Links to People, Places, Publications

Missouri & the 19th Amendment (here)

Virgina Minor Biographical Sketch (here)

Visit the Minor historical marker (here)

Anna Holland Jones Biographical Sketch (here) 

Visit the Jones historical marker (here)

Alma Nash Biographical Sketch (here)

Visit the Nash historical marker (here)

The Golden Lane March of 1916 (here)

Visit Golden Lane historical marker (here)

CM Marihugh is a public history consultant and currently conducting independent research for a book on commemoration of the U.S. women’s suffrage movement. She has an M.A. in Public History from State University of New York, and an M.B.A. from Dartmouth College.

Learn more about:

• National Votes for Women Trail (here)
• National Votes for Women Trail - William G. Pomeroy historical markers (here)
• National Collaborative for Women’s History Sites (here)

Do you have a question, comment, or suggestion? Get in touch! Send an e-mail to NVWTpodcast@ncwhs.org

Transcript

SPEAKERS

Elyssa Ford, Cynthia Holmes, Speaker 1, CM Marihugh, Earth Mama

CM Marihugh  00:00

Welcome to Her March To Democracy, where we're telling stories along The National Votes For Women Trail. The trail chronicles the fight for voting rights for women. The suffragists, or suffs, as they were called, were the revolutionaries of their day, and they battled the powers that be. These foot soldiers cut across the lines of geography, race, ethnicity, class and gender, and numbered in the many 1000s over 70 plus years. 

Earth Mama  00:36

We are standing on the shoulders 

Of the ones who came before us. 

They are saints and they are humans. 

They are angels, they are friends. 

We can see beyond the struggles 

And the troubles and the challenge 

When we know that by our efforts, 

Things will be better in the end.

CM Marihugh  01:09

Each episode is a tour on the trail to the places of struggle, the cities, the towns, where wins and defeats happened over and over again. Our theme music is Standing On The Shoulders by Joyce Johnson Rouse and recorded by Earth Mama. Join us on our travels to hear the stories along The National Votes For Women Trail. 

Today, we are going to the state of Missouri to hear stories about the women's suffrage movement. Missouri has at least seven historical markers that mention women's suffrage, and about 40 sites in The National Votes For Women Trail Database. I'd like to welcome Cynthia Holmes. She is an attorney based in St Louis, and she is the state coordinator for the National Votes For Women Trail. Thanks for joining us, Cynthia, 

Cynthia Holmes  02:07

Thanks for having me. 

CM Marihugh  02:08

Could we start with you giving us an overview of the suffrage movement in Missouri?

Cynthia Holmes  02:15

Yes, thank you. Some of the unique elements that caused suffrage to flourish in Missouri involved the size of the city of St Louis. In 1850 we were the 24th in the nation, and by 1890 we were the fourth. Missouri, and St Louis in particular was where the suffrage movement flourished up until about the 1880s. We had a lot of immigrants that were Irish, German, Italian, a lot of industries came together here, being on the Mississippi River, you had a lot of shipping and industry like that. And a big part of our industry, two big parts actually were brewing and publishing. And by 1900 we had 30 newspapers and magazines in St Louis that were being published. In addition, we're known as the gateway to the West. 

We had an independent spirit. We had a unique Civil War history where the Missouri Compromise had Missouri and Maine come in. One is a free state and Missouri as a slave state, and it is in our old courthouse that we will visit later, that Dred Scott and his wife Harriet sued for their freedom because they had been taken by their masters to a free state. And of course, the Supreme Court of the United States did not allow them their freedom. Denied them citizenship, just like they did one of our famous suffrages that we'll discuss. Some of the earliest suffrage work grew out of the ladies union Aid Society, and this was a group of probably middle to upper class ladies during the Civil War that came together to aid the troops. They did bandages, they did assistance with actual medical care, and really learned to organize in that fashion. 

The ladies union Aid Society in St Louis was founded by a lady named Anna Clapp, and after the war, she was the lady who presided at the first woman suffrage meeting in May 1867 in the city of St Louis. Following that meeting, by 1869 we had the first national organization meeting in St Louis, and as a part of that meeting, the women considered resolutions demanding suffrage that had been drafted by Francis Minor, who was a male partner in this movement. The other involvement of women that helped learning to organize was involvement in temperance groups. They learned leadership, involvement in the public sphere, and really were able to learn how to organize and become advocates for an issue. In 1904 we had the World's Fair in St Louis. 

You might remember, meet me in St Louis, the movie about the family that lived during the World's Fair, and ladies at that point were drafted to participate in leadership by selecting nominees for awards and that sort of thing, which gave them another impetus to organize for a cause. There were problems however, in this area, the beer and liquor industries were huge and very influential, and they fought prohibition a lot, and they fought women's suffrage. They came out in their conventions that sometimes were held at St Louis, with resolutions against women's suffrage, and as a result, like today, they supported politicians who did their biddings and also came out against women's suffrage. 

Our first organizations, as I said, were in St Louis, and in 1867 was the, really the first organization we know about. And that was about a year after a senator, Gratz Brown, had started discussing universal suffrage in DC. And that was in 1866 and that really inspired Virginia Minor to create the St Louis organization in 1867 and between 67 and 1901 suffragists petitioned for a state constitutional amendment enfranchising women about 18 times. Only eight of those positions came to a vote in the Missouri legislature, including the first one in 1867. Each time the Missouri legislators voted against that. 

And during this whole period, we had activities by Anna Clapp, who I mentioned, as well as Adeline Cousins and her daughter, Phoebe. Adeline was active with Anna in that first organization, and throughout her life with the suffrage movement, Phoebe was an interesting woman. She was the first woman law graduate from Washington University in St Louis, and like her dad, she also became a US Marshal, and she was the first woman to ever hold that post. Phoebe pretty much gave up her law career to advocate for suffrage, and was a prolific speaker on that subject. Until Stanley in the early around 1900 she threw her weight in with the brewing industry and became an advocate for them. 

And the thought was that she was so impoverished by that time that she needed the money. Another leader in St Louis was Florence Wyman Richardson. She was the founder of the St Louis Equal Suffrage League. And Florence, like other middle to upper class women, had the time and the energy to devote to the cause. One of her daughters was Florence Richardson Usher, and she was a prolific writer. She was known for keeping a scrapbook of the suffrage movement that survived and just wrote numerous articles about suffrage. Her sister, Hadley, wasn't a writer. She became the first wife of a writer known as Ernest Hemingway. 

A couple years before we had the 19th Amendment, when in 1970 our governor at that time, Frederick Gardiner, was advocating for suffrage. In April of 1919 Missouri passed suffrage for women to vote for president only. And then it was in June that the US, House and Senate passed the 19th Amendment.

CM Marihugh  08:53

In every state we have run up against the industries that did not want women to vote. It depends on the state and the industries that were present there, whether it was railways or textiles or mining, but alcohol always seemed to be present. And of course, they were afraid of reforms in prohibition. They thought women would vote for it. And it's interesting that St Louis the political machine, sounds like it's centered, it was centered on the beer industry. 

Cynthia Holmes  09:28

Very much so. 

CM Marihugh  09:30

So it's another example of when we see the suffragists were not just fighting against trying to convince male voters. They had active lobbyists who had money and then were fighting against them. It just made the fight even harder. Can you tell us where we're going for our first site in Missouri?

Cynthia Holmes  09:52

I am going to take you to a special place. It's known as Bellefontaine Cemetery, and it's on West Florissant road in North St Louis. And you may ask, what does that have to do with suffrage? And I will tell you, Bellefontaine Cemetery is the resting place for many, if not most, of the people that are important in Missouri suffrage story, Anna Clapp, who I mentioned, is buried there, as is Adeline Cousins and Phoebe, Virginia Minor and her husband, Francis, are buried there, as is Reece Happersett, the Registrar of voting and with St Louis, who denied Virginia the right to vote. 

In addition, we have Florence Wyman Richardson and her daughter, Florence Richardson Usher, the writer and Edna Gellhorn, a very active suffragist, plus the 60 beer barons who oppose them, including Eberhard Anheuser and Adolphus Busch. They actually have a beer Baron tour in the fall, which sells out, where they sample it and visit the graves. And Bellefontaine is very proud of its suffragists. They have special monuments dedicated to them. Their website actually talks about many of these women and their place in the movement.

CM Marihugh  11:14

It's great to hear about that. Where are we going to next?

Cynthia Holmes  11:18

We're going to go to a place where there's a historical marker at 2652 Olive Street. Olive Street is in the inner city, in downtown St Louis, runs east and west. At that location, there's actually a business, Provident Counseling, but it was the location of one of Virginia Minors homes. There were several homes of hers in St Louis from time to time, but, and that's the one that there still is basically a good place to put the marker. And the women that run Providentdent Counseling were very thrilled and appreciative to have a historical marker honoring her. 

Virginia Minor was very important to the- our movement, both nationally and particularly in Missouri. Virginia was born in Virginia. She later married Francis Minor, who was an attorney and a distant cousin. It was a real partnership. These two worked for women's suffrage, and I think Francis put his career somewhat on the back burner to fight for women's equality with his wife. They moved to St Louis about 1844 and one of the things that Francis did was- he wanted his wife to own their property. 

Women couldn't at that time, so he designed trusts as they purchased property from time to time that would be controlled by Virginia. He was a real go getter for our movement. Virginia was active and an officer in many of the organizations. 1867 we mentioned that Anna Clapp founded and in 1869 St Louis hosted a National Women's Suffrage convention, and it was at that meeting that Francis and Virginia introduced the idea that the 14th Amendment to the Constitution already protected women's right to vote. 

They argued that since the language of the amendment defined citizenship and required due process and equal protection for all citizens. It would be unconstitutional to exclude women citizens from voting. Their argument grew with suffragists working on this movement, and the strategy became known as the new departure. Francis Minor drafted the pamphlet and the resolutions making those arguments at that convention, and was really an advocate for women until his death in 1892 when Francis died, Susan B Anthony wrote, "No man has contributed to the women's suffrage movement, so much valuable constitutional argument and proof as Mr. Minor." 

As part of their movement and their plan, in 1872 Virginia visited the old courthouse in St Louis. Apparently that was the location of registrar Reese Happersett's office. She was turned away by Reese, and so, as they planned, the Minors filed suit. Francis actually, at that time, was a clerk for the Missouri Supreme Court to avoid any conflict of interest. He resigned that position to take on Virginia's case, since only a male could do that at the time. 

After losing in the state court, they ultimately made it to the US Supreme Court, and the justices ruled against the Minors in March of 1875 the Chief Justice, Morrison Waite, in his decision, declared that the Constitution of the United States does not confer the right of suffrage on anyone, and that voting is not one of the privileges and immunities of citizenship. 

Pretty much after that was when suffragists decided the only way they were going to win the vote universally for women citizens in the United States was going to be through a constitutional amendment forbidding the denial of the right to vote based on sex. Virginia was active throughout this she was president of the National Suffrage Association, which held another convention in 1879 in St Louis. At that time, our mayor was Henry Overstolz, and the lady said he was impolite enough to decline to make a greeting message. 

They surmised that that was that he owed his political career to the Busch family, the Brewers, and the reaction of ladies to Mr. Overstolz was to draft a resolution that asserted that the country was being deprived of half of the intelligence, virtue and practical wisdom it had by denying women the vote. Virginia was active or suffrage until her death in 1894. 

She would not allow her funeral to be attended by any clergyman. She felt that they had long denied women suffrage and worked against it, and she would not have that be there. She's buried by her husband at Bellefontaine Cemetery, and across the road, less than 200 yards away, rests Reese Happersett in an unmarked grave. So he went down in history, but is not remembered fondly. Virginia's will left half of her estate to her single nieces and half to Susan B Anthony. She said the bequest to Susan Anthony was for all she had given to the movement.

CM Marihugh  16:48

When we talk about the suffrage movement, the different strategies that were employed during different eras. In 1872 she attempted to vote. We also know Susan B Anthony, she also attempted to vote in Rochester, New York, she was arrested, but a women around the country attempted to vote that year. Sojourner Truth attempted in Battle Creek, Michigan and in Portland, Oregon, we talked about four women, one black woman, with three white women. They went as a group and attempted to vote. In that case, their ballots were put under the ballot box, so no arrests or anything that dramatic, but certainly letting them know that their ballots would not be counted. I think the importance of the minors and going all the way to the Supreme Court. You know, we don't tell that story enough, so I am really glad you talked about that. Where are we traveling to next? 

Cynthia Holmes  17:58

Well, next we're going to go to a building located at 2108 Locust Street. The historical significance of that building is that the participants in the Golden Lane, the suffragists parade in 1960 took place by that building on Locust Street. The building in 1916 was a printing company, and as I mentioned, printing in St Louis was very, very important at that time. It still stands today, going back to that time, however, in the 1890s late 80s, there were a lot of increases in parades and demonstrations, and the Golden Lane was one of the most prominent.

One of the organizers of that event was Edna Gellhorn. And Edna was a Jewish suffragist. Her parents were active in civic service. She was a graduate of Bryn Mawr, and she married George Gellhorn, an obstetrician, who, like Frances Minor, supported her civic efforts, including working in the suffrage movement. She'd grown up in a wealthy family, but she believed in the value and importance of helping other people and in public service. 

She was deeply involved in the St Louis community, and early in her career as a civic activist, she organized a lot of charity events. She successfully lobbied a woman against ahead of her time for clean drinking water regulations, and helped secure passage of a law requiring better safety standards for milk. Her real calling, though, was to the suffrage movement. She was convinced that without the vote, women were not even second class citizens. She joined the movement big time in 1910 and held offices in the St Louis and Missouri Equal Suffrage League. 

Edna felt so passionate about voting rights for women that she canvassed the northern part of the states, she would ride around on freight trains to different towns, talking to anybody that would listen about the suffrage movement and why it was important. She later said, when she was in her 80s, she was driven, at the time, by a deep passion for women to be allowed the right to contribute to the society, and the boat was necessary for that. So the golden Lane was a walkless, talkless parade. It took place during the 1960 Democratic National Convention. 

At that time, the delegates were staying at the Jefferson Hotel on 12th Street, and we had a huge convention center. It was no longer there, but it was up on Jefferson Avenue. So in order to get from the Jefferson hotel to the convention center, the delegates would have been walking about 11 blocks straight up Locust Street to the convention. 

Our history museum in Missouri said 4 to 8 thousand but it was 1000s, and it was a lot of women dressed in suffrage white, carrying gold parasol some of them had gold colored sashes, and they stood along the street fully lining it for that whole 11 blocks, and they gave a silent stare down to the delegates as they had to walk from their hotels to the convention. 

I read somewhere that some of them were looking at the women mockingly, and some of them had their heads down in shame, I guess, realizing that the women really had a point in needing the right to vote, they also had a living Tableau at one of the libraries in the city on the way that depicted women representing suffrage and non suffrage states and the non suffrage state, women were dressed in mourning clothes. During that march, two little girls, Mary Tossing and Martha Gellhorn, who was Edna Gellhorn's daughter, were there in the front, representing the future voters. 

Their goal was to shame the delegates into including a women's suffrage platform. Unfortunately, the delegates at that times thought it should be left to the states. Edna went on to found the National League of Women Voters, and she championed all women in her activism. In 1919 she was the deciding vote that allowed black women to serve on the St Louis League of Women Voters. They won a small victory in March 1919 when the legislature passed a measure for limited suffrage, allowing women to vote for president only. 

But then by July, 3, the legislature came around, and, as I said, ratified the 19th Amendment. Martha Edna Gellhorn's daughter went on to become a war correspondent. She was very famous, and she snuck onto a ship to be present when we landed at Normandy. And she was the third wife of Ernest Hemingway. I'm not sure why he kept picking out suffrage children, but he recognized the gift.

CM Marihugh  23:04

A walkless, talkless parade to demonstrate that women were essentially silenced without the right to vote. I found a newspaper reference about that event. It was a the St Louis Post Dispatch. There was an editorial that said, quote, "Mutely, asked democracy to throw her a plank in the political sea. She asked, Why shouldn't a female have equal rights? Devotees of liberty and equality look her in the face and tell her why?" I thought that was a very poetic response to that event. 

Cynthia Holmes  23:44

Absolutely. 

CM Marihugh  23:45

So where are we headed to next? 

Cynthia Holmes  23:48

We are going to travel across the state of Missouri to Kansas City to honor a special suffragist, Anna Holland Jones. We're going to 3620 east, 39th Street, where a historical marker honoring her was placed. It's at the Second Baptist Church, which was a place Anna had given an important speech. The church actually was at a different location when Anna spoke. 

It was actually the first African American congregation in Kansas City, founded in 1863 they and their sister congregation had taken a vote and as to whether they wanted to be Baptist or Methodist, and 60% wanted to be Baptist and so a second Baptist Church was founded, and the 40% that wanted to be Methodist founded the oldest AME Church in Kansas City. The church was thrilled to have the historical marker dedicated for Anna. They were honored that they were chosen to have it. 

They actually had a worship service. The pastor called The Gift of the Marker an honour and suffragist a gift from God to the church. So they were very, very welcoming and very thrilled to learn about Anna Holland Jones' background. Anna was born in Ontario Canada in 1855 her father was a runaway slave who had gained his freedom through the Underground Railroad and must have at some point moved back, because he was one of the first black students who graduated from Oberlin College, and that was the first college to admit black students in the US in a segregated manner. 

Anna graduated from there in 1875 following her father, and she was mainly a teacher. She taught at Wilberforce University in Ohio, before she relocated to Kansas City, and she was very highly regarded in Kansas City as a teacher at Lincoln High School for many years, and was the first black woman to become a principal in that area. 

In February 1893 together with a lady named Josephine Yates, another black woman who was also an educator and activist, Anna Jones, helped establish the Women's League of Kansas City. Yates served as president, and Jones was correspondent secretary. She was also very active at the state and national level, and she represented Kansas City in talks that led to founding the National Association of Colored Women's Clubs. 

Those clubs were very important during this era in bringing black women to active- activity in the public sphere, and I think were pretty highly regarded in that capacity, Anna fought for the vote and for education as a means to self determination. The Guiding Principles of that organization were equal rights for women and obtaining the ballot. Anna served as president of the Missouri State Federation of Colored Women's Clubs and Superintendent of Race Literature for The National Association of Colored Women's Clubs. 

While president, she gave an address at the 1906 convention of The State Federation of Colored Women's Clubs, and that was the address and the convention that was held at Second Baptist Church in Kansas City. It was nice, and the church was very proud of the fact that they hosted that convention at that time. In August, 1915 an edition of The Crisis, which is a publication for the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. 

There was an article titled Votes For Women: A Symposium. The symposium featured an article written by Anna Jones entitled Women's Suffrage and Social Reform. In that article, she asked the question, "Why should a woman not have the legal means the ballot to widen and deepen her work?", Jones argued that if women had the ballot, society at whole- as a whole would be improved. 

And she referred to reforms and improvements in those states where women already had the right to vote as examples of the good things that would come to a state with women's suffrage. She was a gifted writer, writing numerous essays making the argument for suffrage. She actually moved, during her last years to the state of California, and following her death, the Black Women's Club in California, in her area established a scholarship to honor her. So she was an important member of the Missouri suffragist movement.

CM Marihugh  28:42

In preparing for this, I read her article in The Crisis. It's interesting that she is presenting her argument saying there's logic in looking at experience to judge success or failure. Look to the states where women can now vote and see that generally they are voting for the needed reforms of social issues. We have one more stop on our tour, and that's Maryville, and you actually recommended that I talk with Dr Elyssa Ford about that story, so I will talk with her, and then we'll come back and ask you about what happened in Missouri beyond 1919.

Cynthia Holmes  29:30

Elyssa Ford is the expert on that. She may mention, she wrote an article called "We Led the Parade", and I'll leave it to you and Elyssa to talk about that.

CM Marihugh  29:40

I'd like to welcome Dr Elyssa Ford, who is a professor of history at Northwest Missouri State University. She is a scholar of gender and sexuality with a focus on the west. And as a public historian, Elyssa has written extensively of the Midwest and northwest Missouri, including on the topic of women's suffrage for the National Park Service. So thank you for being with us, Elyssa. Could you tell us about the story and where we are going to?

Elyssa Ford  30:15

We are going to Maryville, Missouri, where there is a historical marker honoring Alma Nash and the Missouri ladies military band. The historical marker is located at what we call our Downtown Pocket Park, which is on the corners of Main Street and Third Street, and it's adjacent to what is today The Rose Theater, but had originally been The Union Hall, and that location was host to women's suffrage speakers, including Susan B Anthony as well as where Alma Nash's band sometimes practiced and performed. 

But before we talk about Nash and the band in the 1910s I actually would like to rewind several decades, because this local interest in women's suffrage didn't appear out of nowhere. So despite its rural location, Maryville had actually been a kind of hotbed for suffrage activity since the 1870s. Various local groups, from the Library Association to literary societies, kind of everybody, had invited nationally known suffragists to come and speak in town. And these ranged from people I'm sure you've heard of, like Susan B Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton to Helen Keller. 

In total, at least six suffrage speakers spoke in the community, and some of them spoke several times. Large audiences turned out to hear them, and newspapers reported that the speakers were met with enthusiasm. In addition to these speakers, Maryville residents also engaged in suffrage debates in local newspapers and a local branch of the Equal Rights Association, which was a group that pushed for women's suffrage was established at the turn of the century, though much to the amusement of some surrounding communities, which I think tells you that there was something a bit unique about Maryville in this time period. 

So with that background, I want us to go ahead and turn our attention now to this topic of Alma Nash and the members of her band, because this is the environment in which they were raised. So Alma Nash was born in 1883 in Maryville, and after high school, she attended the Maryville Seminary where she studied string instruments, though she could play a lot more instruments than that, and upon graduating, she spent several years traveling the country with different musical groups, and then later returned to Maryville where she opened a private teaching studio. In addition to her own teaching, she also formed various bands and musical ensembles in the community. 

She was constantly announcing in newspapers that she was looking for a new band, and they were performing all the time. And in the fall of 1911 she advertised locally for women specifically to join a new band that she was organizing that was going to be an all women's band. And it is through this new band in 1911 that we see Nash's life converge with the women's suffrage movement. So a couple years into that band existing and performing across the county in January 1913 she saw an advertisement in a Kansas City newspaper asking for applications from bands who wanted to participate in a national parade for women's suffrage, which was going to be held in the nation's capital on March 3 of that year. 

Her Maryville band was made up of young women who were either students at the local college or who were recent graduates who taught school across the county, and it appeared that they were enthusiastic about playing a role in getting women the vote, and so the group decided to apply, and almost immediately, they received a letter back saying that they were accepted, and then they had to work pretty like feverishly over the next several weeks to fundraise to get enough money to be able to travel to the parade and also learning to march. And this is kind of a key and surprising point, because they had only been a concert band to that point. 

Of the approximately 30 members of the band, 22 of them went to the parade, and so they left Maryville on March 1, which was the start of a multi day, kind of non stop train ride to DC. And on the way, they gave musical performances for other travelers. It seems like they were really making friends wherever they went. And they even scheduled a pit stop, or maybe they didn't schedule it, but they made a pit stop in Pennsylvania so that they could actually practice marching and playing outside for the first time, because the cold and snowy winter weather of Maryville meant that they had only ever practiced marching and playing simultaneously by walking back and forth the small kind of indoor stage and performance spaces available in Maryville. 

So they only had one outdoor experience of doing this before they actually got to the multi mile parade. They arrived in DC early in the morning on the third and then quickly had to regroup for the parade because it was scheduled to start at 2pm that afternoon. So I'll go ahead and like fast forward actually, to some of the information that came out after the parade. So following the parade, the Maryville band and Alma Nash in particular, were featured in newspapers across the country, now called the Missouri Ladies Military Band. 

And if you don't know, military often was used at the time to describe a marching band. This was a name that they clearly adopted or had been given to them at this point because they were not a military or marching band prior to the parade, but it's with that name that is how they are known and remembered today. So following the parade, the front page of the march 3, 1913, edition of the St Louis Globe Democrat reported how Missouri suffragists had planned for the Maryville band to lead the Missouri section of The National Suffrage Parade because the groups from states were all marching together, but the bigger organizers of the parade had instead, quote, "seen fit to place them at the head of the entire line." 

And this is something that was explained as being done because they were apparently the only all women's band participating in the parade, and thus organizers kind of deemed that they needed to have a more prominent position than kind of hidden in the back with the Missouri section. Upon their arrival home from DC the march 8, 1913 issue of maryville's Daily Democrat Forum, one of the local newspapers included commentary from Nash and a front page article, and she described her band's participation in the national suffrage demonstration as follows. 

Quote, "We were not right in the lead when the parade started because a mounted escort of women and a number of officers of the national equal Suffrage Association, walking behind with our band, following was the order in which we first started. We had gone but a short distance however, when the crowd began closing up toward the line of the parade and men were blocking a place in the street a short distance ahead, when one of the suffragist officers came rushing back to us and told us to march on ahead and lead, and that it would be necessary for the band to open the way, which proved to be true. 

We were not molested in the least. And although the march was slow on account of the great crowds, no one offered to stand in our way down the avenue." End quote. In this occurrence of them being kind of pushed to the front of the parade, is why Alma Nash and the band end up receiving so much attention afterwards. In addition to that attention, and there were like full scale photographs of Alma Nash that appeared in newspapers across the entire country. 

But after the parade, Nash and the band members continued their suffrage advocacy. For instance, they toured the state of Missouri that summer and gave performances that they claimed would, quote, soothe the savage hearts of man through music. I have no idea what they played, but I would love to find out what this music was, though it failed in actually soothing the hearts of man through music to get them to vote for suffrage. 

However, like many of the suffrage efforts, the Maryville band members had to wait for years to see suffrage actually happen. In fact, the Missouri State legislature voted against it for repeated time. Shortly after the national parade, Alma Nash's role as the leader of this band, where she actively encouraged her band members to get involved with the suffrage parade, as well as other regional and statewide activities, was important not just for the parade itself, but also for spreading the message about the parade and women's suffrage through the many news reports that were published about her following the event. 

And members of her band also continued to be enthusiastic supporters of the vote, with one writing home that she had to quote debate suffrage across the county, and this was actually a woman who wasn't able to attend the parade itself because she played the piano, and you can't really march with the piano, but she was clearly a supporter of suffrage. And then another former band member who had traveled to DC said that when the 19th Amendment passed, she was in a general store in the area and was so excited that she stood on the counter and danced. And I think that image of success at long last, and the delight with that success is a great place to end.

CM Marihugh  39:39

She danced on the counter. You know, I was thinking before we talked about something we haven't addressed yet in the podcast, is this was another tool that the suffrage movement used music. There were a number of suffrage songs and anthems that they sang at conventions and rallies and events, titles like "Daughters Of Freedom, The Ballot Be Yours." 

And I also saw that there were songs that were meant to be played by brass bands, one called Fall In Line. And of course, there were on the other side songs that mocked the women I saw, one entitled "Mind The Baby, I Must Vote Today, with a woman going out the door all dressed up to vote and her poor husband in a rocking chair with a screaming child. And of course, that was a trope of the time that women voting would mean that men would be taking care of the babies in the home. But this was also a period where so much music was sold as sheet music, and so suffragists rightly saw this as another way to promote their cause. 

Elyssa Ford  40:55

We don't actually know what they played and in the parade or what their program was when they toured that summer. But I'm actually hopeful we might be able to find out, because the Nodaway County Historical Society, and Nodaway County is where Maryville and then this plaque is, we recently acquired the Alma Nash archives, which we hadn't actually known existed. And so in those archives, there's a lot of music that she wrote. She had written an opera, and there's the full opera there. And I I'm curious to dive into it more to see if anything happens to mention specifically what they played in either of those. There are a few, like flyers that do say some of the things they played at their other concerts. So I'm not sure. 

CM Marihugh  41:42

I'm so glad we had you on today, and thank you for sharing this story with us. 

Elyssa Ford  41:47

Thank you so much!

CM Marihugh  41:49

Cynthia, could you give us an overview of what happened in the state after Congress passed the 19th Amendment? 

Cynthia Holmes  41:57

Yes, we ratified it, as I said, on July 3, 1919, becoming the 11th state, and women started to vote. You actually told me a story about our first voter, Marie Byman, and what she went through to become that first and I think people would be fascinated to hear that from you. 

CM Marihugh  42:17

I just thought it was such a great story. Just briefly in the town of Hannibal, which is of Mark Twain fame five days after the adoption of the 19th Amendment. August 31 1920 Hannibal held a special election to fill a vacancy on the city council, and Marie Byram. Apparently she and another woman were jokingly talking about who would be the first to vote. Marie went with her husband. 

They left their home at 5:30am apparently it was raining. They walked 15 blocks to the polling place, and when they arrived, their clothes were quite damp, but she signed the register and cast her vote by 7am and she became the first woman to vote in Hannibal that she knew, she later heard that She was the first woman to vote in Missouri after the 19th Amendment had been ratified, even a little later it's been established, at least, according to the source I read, that she was the first woman in the United States to Vote after the 19th Amendment had been fully ratified and adopted into the Constitution.

Cynthia Holmes  43:45

One little detail too that I thought was hilarious was that Marie and her husband walked in the rain, and apparently the other lady showed up in a car, like a bit too late. And of course, Missouri, being the show me state, we got to show the country what voting looked like that way, and I'm sure there were voting restrictions, a lot of ID requirements coming back into play that may have been around then. In Missouri, we've got polling places closing now, so people may have to drive for miles and miles to get to an actual polling place, and those are in some of our poorest areas. So the fight goes on.

CM Marihugh  44:22

You're absolutely right. That is something that we've learned over the decades, over the centuries. You cannot take it for granted, and people just have to continue to press on. But I really thank you for being with us today and telling us these fascinating stories along The National Votes for Women Trail in Missouri.

Cynthia Holmes  44:46

Thank you. We appreciate the opportunity to do so.

CM Marihugh  44:50

Thank you for joining us this week. We hope you contact us with comments or questions. The National Votes For Women Trail Project is a work in Progress, please click on the support the project link to contribute to our ongoing work. The trail is a project of The National Collaborative for Women's History Sites, a non profit organization dedicated to putting women's history on the map. Our theme is Standing On The Shoulders by Joyce Johnson Rouse and recorded by Earth Mama, be sure to join us next time. 

Earth Mama  45:27

I am standing on the shoulders 

Of the ones who came before me. 

I am honored by the passion for our liberty. 

I will stand a little taller.

I will work a little longer, 

And my shoulders will be there to hold the ones who follow me. 

My shoulders will be there to hold the ones who follow me.