SUFFRAGE STATE BY STATE

“Her Flag” by Marilyn Artus

The National Women’s History Alliance has put together a very thorough newsletter detailing commemorative events broken down by state, as well as a list of relevant media and resources celebrating the centennial through 2020 and into 2021.

Highlights include local projects and celebrations, large-scale art pieces and monuments, museum exhibits and more. The newsletter will also serve as a lasting resource once the month of celebration is through after August 26, 2020, as it contains a wealth of information and links to ongoing projects and educational resources related to women’s history and the suffrage movement.

View suffrage centennial events in each state.

EVENT CALENDAR: AUGUST 2020

National Women’s Suffrage Month

In coordination with politicians such as Senator Tammy Baldwin (D-WI), Senator Susan Collins (R-ME), Congresswoman Debbie Lesko (R-AZ) and Congresswoman Brenda Lawrence (D-MI), the Women’s Suffrage Centennial Commission worked to designate August 2020 as National Women’s Suffrage Month!

In celebration of both this designation and the centennial of women’s suffrage in the United States that it represents, the Women’s Suffrage Centennial Commission has put together a calendar of events, ranging from musical performances and film screenings to conversations with female thought leaders.

This calendar also contains a schedule for podcast episode releases related to the suffrage centennial, such as And Nothing Less hosted by Rosario Dawson and Retta.

It also includes the WSCC’s Forward Into Light Celebration on August 26, when buildings and landmarks across the country will light up in purple and gold in celebration of the centennial. The campaign is named for the historic suffrage slogan, “Forward through the Darkness, Forward into Light.”

View the full calendar.

VIRTUAL TOUR: Explore Alice Paul’s Home

In honor of the suffrage centennial and in compliance with social distancing guidelines, the Alice Paul Institute has released a video tour of Paulsdale, the historic home of suffrage activist Alice Paul, so that history lovers may still enjoy her incredible story from home. The videos cover the life of Alive Paul, the suffrage movement and her legacy through the history of women’s rights.

View the full video playlist here.

INTERACTIVE EXPERIENCE: “She Resisted: Strategies of Suffrage”

As part of their American Experience documentary series on U.S. history, PBS has created an online interactive experience that uses video, audio and primary sources to explore the different methods used by suffrage activists. In addition to illustrating the different forms of events, publications and demonstrations that contributed to the movement, the site also features an interactive map that shows the shows the suffrage timeline state by state.

Explore the interactive project here.

VIDEO SERIES: Suffrage in 60 Seconds from the Belmont-Paul National Monument

In honor of the centennial anniversary of women’s suffrage in the U.S., the Belmont-Paul Women’s Equality National Monument has been running a video series on Facebook titled Suffrage in 60 Seconds.

In these short videos, park rangers explain prominent topics and figures in the history of women’s suffrage, such as Ida B. Wells, Inez Milholland Boissevain and African American women and the vote.

View the full series here.

Film: Votes for Women (1996)

This 20-minute film gives an overview of the women’s suffrage movement in the United States. Here’s a summary:

Votes for Women (1996), Produced for the 75^thAnniversary of the 19^th Amendment, granting Women the Right to Vote. A perfect overview of the 72 year-long struggle, from 1848 to 1920. The film covers not only the national campaign, but also leaders and individual states.

Votes for Women celebrates the magnificent campaign, the ultimate victory, and the paths that contemporary women are taking in politics.

With the voices of Constance Towers, Jean Stapelton, John Wesley, Rue McClanahan, Susan Clark, Carole Ita White, Marla Gibbs, Liz Torres, Kathy Najimy and Susan Ruttan, this film sets archival photographs, stock footage and live action to narration, music from the Suffrage Movement, and a new verse, to Kay Weaver’s anthem “One Fine Day.”

“Votes for Women” was produced by Kay Weaver and Martha Wheelock, who also directed two other documentaries on the suffrage movement: “Forward Into Light,” about Inez Mulholland, and “California Women Win the Vote!”

You can buy the film here.

Virtual Resource on Suffrage Leader Alice Paul

This website on suffrage activist Alice Paul was created by author and activist Zoe Nicholson (who is also the creator of the performance “Tea With Alice & Me“.)

It features a wealth of material on Paul, who utilized non-violent civil disobedience tactics to help win suffrage in the U.S.

The website has chapters on Paul’s life and political philosophy, photos, a bibliography of books and articles on Paul and video and audio.

Browse the whole website here.

British National Archives: Documents and Multimedia on Suffrage

To mark the 100th anniversary of British women of property winning the right to vote, and the 90th anniversary of all women getting to vote in Britain, the National Archives created a website filled with primary source documents, videos and teaching resources.

Among the notable aspects of the site is a section detailing how website visitors can comb through government documents on the suffrage movement, including some documents that you can view online. These documents detail “the government’s response to militant activities and civil disobedience such as destruction of property, tax evasion and census boycotts.” There are also links to archival footage of suffrage actions and newspaper reports.

It also includes new films—like the one below created by young people in collaboration with filmmaker Nigel Kellaway—on the British suffrage movement.

Check out the entire website here.

Documentary on Inez Milholland: “Forward Into Light”

This fifteen-minute documentary tells the story of Inez Milholland, an important player in the suffrage movement, as well as a death penalty abolitionist and advocate for the poor.

Along with Alice Paul, Milholland was part of the radical wing of the suffrage movement, using disruptive tactics that rankled some other suffrage leaders who thought radical tactics like protesting President Woodrow Wilson would alienate the elected officials suffragists’ needed to win voting rights. As the website for “Forward Into Light” explains:

Known for her elegance, beauty and public presence, [Milholland] led a big march down Fifth Avenue for New York Suffrage in 1912. On the heels of that great spectacle, Inez was drafted by Alice Paul to lead the NAWSA radical parade to disturb the inauguration of the newly elected Democrat, Woodrow Wilson. March 3, 1913. Inez led 8,000 women down Pennsylvania Avenue to the White House.

Though Milholland fell ill in 1916, she decided to complete an already-planned speaking tour. She died after speaking at a suffrage event in Los Angeles. The “Forward Into Light” website explains that Milholland “[s]tanding at the podium…wobbled and fell to the floor, gasping her famous last public words, ‘Mr. President, How Long Must Women Wait for Liberty?’”

“Forward Into Light” can be ordered for $4.95 at the website. The site also offers other resources, such as links to further research and photos.

Watch a trailer for the film here:

Film: After the Vote: The Women Who Changed New York

Filmmaker Dawn Scibilia is at work on a new documentary titled “After the Vote: The Women Who Changed New York.”

The movie, a work in progress, will focus on the women who helped win New York women the vote in 1917 and went on to have a huge impact on New York politics. Here’s more on the documentary’s subject matter from New York Women in Film & Television:

After winning the vote in 1917 many women achieved prominence in mainstream political life, in New York and on a national level, long before the modern feminist movement of the 1960s. During the 1920s and 30s, politically active women were deeply engaged in reorganizing the state government, reforming the city charter and municipal justice system, creating low-income housing, establishing maternity and infant care, advancing women’s legal and reproductive rights, restricting child labor, and creating a minimum wage.

Scibilia is collecting donations here to help finish the documentary.

Watch a trailer for the work-in-progress film here:

After The Vote Directed by: Dawn Scibilia from Dawn Scibilia on Vimeo.