Mynderse Academy - Myndersian Yearbook (Seneca Falls, NY)

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SQ In an age when women have entered into every profession and every field of labor naturally and efficiently and have disclosed the great variety and relative importance of their achievements, it is proper that we look back and reflect upon the change in women's position and pay due respect to the agi- tators and organizers of the movement. The entering wed e of the movement in the legis- lature had been madge by Ansel Bascom, a practicing lawyer in Seneca Falls, in the legislature of 1845. Married women for the first time had the right to hold property. In the constitutional convention of 1846 and 1847, women were given the right to earn money and to be the uardians of their own children. Now it was demancied that there be a still more revolutionary bill giving them the right to vote. Seneca Falls not only had the honor of being the first village to recruit that crusading army, but it may also claim four of its outstanding leaders for her own: Mrs. Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Mrs. Lucretia Mott, Mrs. Amelia Jenks Bloomer, and Miss Susan Mrs- Elizabeth Cady Stanton B. Anthony. On July 19, 1848, the first convention for women's rights was held in Seneca Falls in the old Wesleyan Methodist Church, which then stood at the corner of Fall and Mynderse Streets. This meeting was called by Mrs. Lucretia Mott and Mrs. Elizabeth Cady Stanton, who had been a delegate to the Anti- Slavery Congress in London but was refused admittance because of her sex. Therewith, she conceived her idea of woman suffrage, and it was she who inspired Mrs. Mott with her crusading zeal. Both women were natives of this village of Seneca Falls, and together they convinced the women of this community of the necessity of improving their legal and political status. At this early meeting, the first proclamation that women should have the right to vote was voiced. After two days of discussions and conferences, a bill of women's grievances called the Declaration of Sentiments based in form on the Declaration of Independence was drawn up. Fifty women and almost as many men immediately sub- scribed. Mrs. Amelia Jenks Bloomer, who is well-known for her famous Bloomer costume, attended the first meeting but did not enter actively into the movement at this time, being fully occupied with temperance reform. Later, however, she threw all her influence and that of her paper, The Lib, the first newspaper Mm Lucretia Mott published by women, into the cause.

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MISS EMILY BENNING SMITH History Instructor WHEN MACAULAY SAID THAT TO BE A TRULY GREAT HISTORIAN IS PER' HAPS THE RAREST OF INTELLECTUAL DISTINCTIONS, HE MIGHT HAVE HAD IN MIND OUR MISS EMILY SMITH. HER WEALTH OF HISTORICAL LORE HAS BEEN SUCH A VALUABLE CONTRIBUTION TO SCHOOL LIFE THAT THE CLASS OF NINETEEN THIRTY-FIVE IS HAPPY TO NAME HER DEDICATEE OF THIS, THEIR MYNDERSIAN. S EDICA IO

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It had been started as a roject to further the temperance movement, but Mrs. Bloomer wrote hersel and accepted from Mrs. Stanton numerous editor- ials explaining and electioneering for the cause of woman's rights. This paper attracted wide-spread attention and was instrumental in interesting Miss Susan B. Anthony in the movement. I Miss Susan B. Anthony came to Seneca Falls in 1850 to attend an anti-slavery convention and was a guest of Mrs. Bloomer. The two ladies were return- ing from one of the meetings when they stopped on a street corner to wait for Mrs. Stanton. It was here that Mrs. Stanton and Miss Anthony were intro- duced. Afterward, they met at Mrs. Stanton's home, and the path was opened for future intercourse. It was, as Mrs. Stanton says in her history, an eventful meeting that later shaped in a measure their future lives. Neither Mrs. Stanton or Miss Anthony could have accomcplished such great things without the Mgssgum Bamhony help and a vice of the other. Miss Anthony in- '1'P'ff f1'M fG- 14- Wffwfb fluenced Mrs. Stanton to go abroad into active life, and, without this encouragement, it is highly improbable that Mrs. Stanton would have attempted such an extensive movement. On the other hand, Mrs. Stanton's complete knowledge of the subject made her invaluable to Miss Anthony. They worked together in perfect unison helping and strengthening each other in accomplishing great things for women and humanity. Many of the greatest movements in the annals of this country have had their beginnings in small towns, and Seneca Falls has contributed no mean share to the advancement of our state and nation in giving those determined leaders to the country. Their dauntless spirit has Carried women from a con- dition of servitude to a place equally respected with that of men. Seneca Falls will be forever proud and grateful to these workers for their contributions to the advancement of the station of womankind. What of the future? It has been said that emanci- pation without duty is a mirage of pleasure which raises thirst but never quenches it. Every woman of today is a leader in this action and must bend every effort to preserve the place which these women of yesterday have obtained. Will women respond to the call that comes to them out of the past with its limitations and the present with its onrushing of events? The future holds the answer to that query which must be in the affirmative if the march of Time for the women of the world is to lead them to achieve the heights these women we honor envisaged. Mrs, Amelia Bloomer