Democratic Ideals. A Memorial Sketch of Clara B. Colby.
[Washington, DC: Federal Suffrage Association, 1917]. First edition of Olympia Brown’s biographical sketch of her colleague and personal friend. Brown served as the president of the Federal Suffrage Association when Colby worked with the organization during her later years. With frontisportrait of Colby and title-page vignette map showing which areas in North America had achieved women’s suffrage. The present work includes Colby’s long-form poem, “The Song of the Plains” (pp. 19-29), and a bibliography of Colby’s writings (pp. 104-108). Small spot of light toning to frontisportrait and title-page. Hinge cracking between pages 16 and 17; first gathering somewhat loose. A very good, bright copy. Publisher’s blue cloth titled in gilt. Octavp/. 116 pp. Item #16876
Clara Bewick Colby (1846 – 1916) was the longtime president of the Nebraska Woman Suffrage Association and the founder of the Woman’s Tribune, the leading American suffrage publication and the official organ of the National Woman Suffrage Association. She was also a poet, literary critic, lecturer, and the first woman to be officially appointed as a war correspondent. As a writer, Colby contributed to The Woman’s Bible (1895) and wrote articles for magazines including Harper’s Bazaar and Arena. The present work makes particular note of Colby’s involvement with the Federal Suffrage Association and her work with Brown.
Olympia Brown (1835 – 1926) was the head of the Wisconsin Suffrage Association, the president of the Federal Suffrage Association between 1903 and 1920, and the first woman to be ordained in the Unitarian Church. She was also a charter member of the American Equal Rights Association. Susan B. Anthony, Lucy Stone, and other suffragists often called on Brown to lecture because of her strong speaking skills, and in just one summer Brown delivered over 300 speeches while on tour in Kansas. Unlike many suffragists of her generation, Brown was alive to vote after the passage of the Nineteenth Amendment; her final suffrage march was at the 1920 Republican National convention, just two months before the ratification of the Nineteenth Amendment. Krichmar, The Women’s Rights Movement in the United States, 4588.
Price: $950.00