Second generation suffragists parading in 1912

Second generation suffragists parading in 1912

Second-generation suffragists parading in 1912.

Frances "Fanny" Wright

Frances "Fanny" Wright

Frances "Fanny" Wright (1795–1852) was a prominent early feminist and sex radical, as well as an abolitionist and a freethinker. She was one of the first women to address audiences of mixed sex across the United States, including in west-central New York State, and led a life of sexual liberation by the standards of her time.

Susan B. Anthony

Susan B. Anthony

Susan B. Anthony (1820–1906) began her career in abolition work before emerging as one of the three major leaders of the woman suffrage movement alongside Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Matilda Joslyn Gage. When suffrage was finally achieved in 1920 through the Nineteenth Amendment to the U. S. Constitution, it was popularly called "the Susan B. Anthony Amendment."

Elizabeth Cady Stanton

Elizabeth Cady Stanton

Elizabeth Cady Stanton (1815–1902) helped organize the 1848 Woman's Rights Convention at Seneca Falls that launched the suffrage movement. For decades she led that movement alongside Susan B. Anthony and Matilda Joslyn Gage. Long a freethinker, Stanton only made her heterodox views clear beginning in 1895, when she published the first volume of her Woman's Bible. By 1898 she had been largely ejected from the suffrage movement, and was able to publish only in freethought periodicals.

Matilda Joslyn Gage

Matilda Joslyn Gage

Matilda Joslyn Gage (1826–1898) grew up in an abolitionist household. She soon embraced the woman suffrage movement, emerging alongside Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton, the "Triumvirate" who led the movement in its early decades. After 1878 Gage's outspoken criticism of Christianity as woman's oppressor would gradually see her driven from the suffrage movement. She ended her career as a freethought activist.

Elizabeth Smith Miller

Elizabeth Smith Miller

Elizabeth Smith Miller (1822–1911), daughter of philanthropist Gerrit Smith, campaigned for woman's rights / suffrage and financially supported the movement. She became best known as a dress reformer, inventing the so-called "Bloomer" costume of a practical knee-length skirt over pantaloons (shown). In later life she persuaded Geneva millionaire William Smith to fund a revolutionary college for women that still operates today.

Associated Sites

Associated Historical Events

The Trial of Susan B. Anthony

June 18–20, 1873

Thirty-Third NY State Suffrage Convention

October 29–November 1, 1901

Forty-Third NY State Suffrage Convention

October 31–November 3, 1911

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