Elizabeth King Ellicott (1858–1914) was an American

suffragist Suffrage, political franchise, or simply franchise, is the right to vote in public, political elections and referendums (although the term is sometimes used for any right to vote). In some languages, and occasionally in English, the right to v ...

Biography

Ellicott was born in 1858 to a wealthy

Baltimore Baltimore ( , locally: or ) is the List of municipalities in Maryland, most populous city in the U.S. state of Maryland, fourth most populous city in the Mid-Atlantic (United States), Mid-Atlantic, and List of United States cities by popula ...

family. After studying at the Howland Institute, she returned to Baltimore. Several years later, she and several friends opened the Bryn Mawr School for Girls in 1885. That same group four years later donated $500,000 to

Johns Hopkins University Johns Hopkins University (Johns Hopkins, Hopkins, or JHU) is a private research university in Baltimore, Maryland. Founded in 1876, Johns Hopkins is the oldest research university in the United States and in the western hemisphere. It consi ...

, on the condition that they allow women to attend the

medical university A medical school is a tertiary educational institution, or part of such an institution, that teaches medicine, and awards a professional degree for physicians. Such medical degrees include the Bachelor of Medicine, Bachelor of Surgery (MBBS, M ...

. In 1894, she founded the Women's Literary Club and Arundel club in Baltimore. In 1900, the latter club would merge into the Maryland Federation of Women's Clubs, of which Ellicott was elected president of the board. That same year, she married William Miller Ellicott. Six years later, after resigning from the board, she became involved in the suffrage movement. She organized the Equal Suffrage League of Baltimore out of the nearly defunct Livermore Equal Rights League. The league worked closely with the Maryland Woman Suffrage Association. The Baltimore League broke permanently from the Maryland League in 1910, when they submitted an equal suffrage bill to the

Maryland General Assembly The Maryland General Assembly is the state legislature of the U.S. state of Maryland that convenes within the State House in Annapolis. It is a bicameral body: the upper chamber, the Maryland Senate, has 47 representatives and the lower chamber ...

, which was quickly defeated. After the break, Ellicott formed a competing association, the State Equal Franchise League of Maryland, in 1911. The club began publishing ''The New Voter'', Maryland's first suffrage magazine. After suffering from ill health for years, she died of

pneumonia Pneumonia is an inflammatory condition of the lung primarily affecting the small air sacs known as alveoli. Symptoms typically include some combination of productive or dry cough, chest pain, fever, and difficulty breathing. The severi ...

and a subsequent heart failure on May 14, 1914. She left about $250,000 to many establishments. A large portion of the money went to establishing the Elizabeth King Ellicott Fellowship for the Political Education of Women at

Goucher College Goucher College ( ') is a private liberal arts college in Towson, Maryland. It was chartered in 1885 by a conference in Baltimore led by namesake John F. Goucher and local leaders of the Methodist Episcopal Church.https://archive.org/details/h ...

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Ellicott, Elizabeth King 1858 births 1914 deaths American suffragists Deaths from pneumonia in the United States