Maud Wood Park (January 25, 1871 – May 8, 1955) was an American suffragist and women's rights activist.

Career overview

She was born in Boston, Massachusetts. In 1887 she graduated from St. Agnes School in Albany, New York, after which she taught for eight years before attending

Radcliffe College Radcliffe College was a women's liberal arts college in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and functioned as the female coordinate institution for the all-male Harvard College. Considered founded in 1879, it was one of the Seven Sisters colleges and he ...

. While there she married Charles Edward Park. She graduated from Radcliffe, where she was one of only two students who supported suffrage for women, in 1898. In 1900 she attended the National American Women Suffrage Association convention, where she discovered that, at the age of 29, she was the youngest delegate present. Park determined to attract a younger group of women to the organization and, in concert with Inez Haynes Gillmore, formed the

College Equal Suffrage League The College Equal Suffrage League (CESL) was an American woman suffrage organization founded in 1900 by Maud Wood Park and Inez Haynes Irwin (''nee'' Gillmore), as a way to attract younger Americans to the women's rights movement. The League spurred ...

.Library of Congress. American Memory: Votes for Women
''One Hundred Years toward Suffrage: An Overview''
compiled by E. Susan Barber with additions by Barbara Orbach Natanson. Retrieved on May 28, 2009. She toured colleges promoting it, and started chapters in thirty states. She also organized the National College Equal Suffrage League in 1908. Park was friends with another American suffragist,

Carrie Chapman Catt Carrie Chapman Catt (; January 9, 1859 Fowler, p. 3 – March 9, 1947) was an American women's suffrage leader who campaigned for the Nineteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, which gave U.S. women the right to vote in 1920. Catt ...

, who recruited her to campaign in Washington, D.C. for the Nineteenth Amendment, which is the amendment that guarantees suffrage for American women. In 1901 Park became one of the founders of the

Boston Equal Suffrage Association for Good Government The Boston Equal Suffrage Association for Good Government (BESAGG) was an American organization devoted to women's suffrage in Massachusetts. It was active from 1901 to 1920. Like the College Equal Suffrage League, it attracted younger, less risk-a ...

(BESAGG), which became the

League of Women Voters The League of Women Voters (LWV or the League) is a nonprofit, nonpartisan political organization in the United States. Founded in 1920, its ongoing major activities include registering voters, providing voter information, and advocating for vot ...

of Boston when the Nineteenth Amendment was ratified in 1920. She was BESAGG's executive secretary for twelve years. In 1920 Park became the first president of the

, a position she held until resigning in 1924 for reasons of health. From 1925 until 1928 she was the League's legislative counselor. Park also organized the lobbying group known as the Women's Joint Congressional Committee in 1924, and worked as its chairwoman. This group was instrumental in the passage of the

Sheppard–Towner Act The Promotion of the Welfare and Hygiene of Maternity and Infancy Act, more commonly known as the Sheppard–Towner Act, was a 1921 U.S. Act of Congress that provided federal funding for maternity and childcare. It was sponsored by Senator Morris ...

of 1921 and the

Cable Act The Cable Act of 1922 (ch. 411, 42 Stat. 1021, "Married Women's Independent Nationality Act") was a United States federal law that partially reversed the Expatriation Act of 1907. (It is also known as the Married Women's Citizenship Act or the Wo ...

of 1922, both of which advanced women's rights. Park pioneered the "front door lobby," a direct approach to lobbying that symbolized the idealism of woman suffrage. She cowrote the book ''Front Door Lobby. (An Account of the Achievement of Woman Suffrage in the United States),'' with Edna Lamprey Stantial, which was finally published in 1960. She also wrote the play '' Lucy Stone'', which was first produced in 1939 in Boston.

Personal life and education

Park attended Radcliffe College where her professors and classmates alike were either against women's suffrage or had little interest in it.Strom, Sharon Hartman. "Leadership and Tactics in the American Woman Suffrage Movement: A New Perspective from Massachusetts." ''The Journal of American History'' 62, no. 2 (1975): 296-315. Being one of the few college women interested in suffrage, she was invited to speak at the

Massachusetts Woman Suffrage Association The Massachusetts Woman Suffrage Association (MWSA) was an American organization devoted to women's suffrage in Massachusetts. It was active from 1870 to 1919. History The MWSA was founded in 1870 by suffrage activists Julia Ward Howe, Lucy Stone, ...

annual dinner during her senior year. While at Radcliffe, she met and later married Charles Edward Park; he died in 1904. She secretly married Robert Freeman Hunter in 1908. He died suddenly in 1928.

Work with the National American Women Suffrage Association

From 1917–1919, Park led the congressional lobbying effort of the

National American Woman Suffrage Association The National American Woman Suffrage Association (NAWSA) was an organization formed on February 18, 1890, to advocate in favor of women's suffrage in the United States. It was created by the merger of two existing organizations, the National ...

in which her task was to obtain congressional approval of the woman suffrage amendment. Park trained volunteers visiting Washington, D.C. to lobby their congressional representatives and coordinated the lobbying effort of the association. She developed strategies to get the amendment passed including keeping in-depth biographical and personal records of the members of congress."Park, Maud Wood". In From Suffrage to the Senate: America's Political Women. Amenia: Grey House Publishing, 2006. Because of World War I, Congress was only debating war-related issues at this time, but through her connections, Park was able to get a special committee on women's suffrage to be formed. This committee approved a woman's suffrage amendment which the House of Representatives approved in 1918. The Senate approved it in 1919 and sent it to the states for ratification. In 1920 the 19th Amendment was ratified.

Work with other organizations

Maud Wood Park founded the

in 1900 with Inez Haynes in order to get younger, more well educated women involved in the suffrage movement. Their particular aim was to get college alumnae to form chapters and organize women at their alma maters. In 1904,

Harriot Eaton Stanton Blatch Harriot Eaton Blatch ( Stanton; January 20, 1856–November 20, 1940) was an American writer and suffragist. She was the daughter of pioneering women's rights activist Elizabeth Cady Stanton. Biography Harriot Eaton Stanton was born, the sixt ...

and Caroline Lexow invited them to set up college leagues throughout New York state. In 1906, the

invited the College Equal Suffrage League to initiate similar organizations throughout the country. Maud Wood Park was also one of the founders of the Boston Equal Suffrage Association for Good Government (BESAGG) along with

Pauline Agassiz Shaw Pauline Agassiz Shaw (February 6, 1841 – February 10, 1917) was an American philanthropist and social reformer who opened day nurseries, settlement houses, and other establishments in Boston to help new immigrants and the poor. She financed pub ...

and Mary Hutcheson Page. She and Page were in charge of decision making and public speaking. The BESAGG turned into The League of Women Voters after women got the right to vote in 1920. Maud Wood Park also became the president of The League of Women Voters in 1920. During her time in this position (until 1924), she traveled the US to lecture and recruit for new members and she helped develop the legislative agenda. Park said of the aim of The League of Women Voters, "It has chosen to be a middle-of-the-road organization in which persons of widely differing political views might work out together a program of definite advance on which they could agree. It has been willing to go ahead slowly in order to go ahead steadily. It has not sought to lead a few women a long way quickly, but rather to lead many women a little way at a time."A Record of Four Years in the National League of Women Voters, 1920-1924. Washington: National League of Women Voters, 1924. Maud Wood Park helped organize and head the Women's Joint Congressional Committee which passed the Sheppard–Towner Maternity and Infancy Protection Act of 1921 and the

in 1922.

Later life

Park began the

Schlesinger Library The Arthur and Elizabeth Schlesinger Library on the History of Women in America is a research library at the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study, Harvard University. According to Nancy F. Cott, the Carl and Lily Pforzheimer Foundation Director, ...

on August 26, 1943, when she donated her collection of books, papers, and memorabilia on female reformers to Radcliffe. This donation grew into a research library called the "Women's Archives," which was renamed in 1965 after

Elizabeth Bancroft Schlesinger Elizabeth Bancroft Schlesinger (July 3, 1886 – June 3, 1977) was an American suffragist, civic leader, feminist, and pioneer in the field of women's history. Early years and family Elizabeth Bancroft Schlesinger was born in Columbus, Ohio to Cl ...

and her husband

Arthur M. Schlesinger Arthur Meier Schlesinger Sr. (; February 27, 1888 – October 30, 1965) was an American historian who taught at Harvard University, pioneering social history and urban history. He was a Progressive Era intellectual who stressed material cau ...

, as they were strong supporters of the library's mission. Park died in 1955 in Massachusetts.

References

External links

Papers of Maud Wood Park in the Woman’s Rights Collection
{{DEFAULTSORT:Park, Maud Wood 1871 births 1955 deaths Activists from Boston American suffragists American feminists American women's rights activists Radcliffe College alumni College Equal Suffrage League