April 2010 Archives

"Conference on Suffrage: One Hundred Women Are Expected to Attend Sessions," Oregonian, April 3, 1906, 14.

Oregon suffragists prepared for the June 1906 election that would bring the question of votes for women to the ballot after the resounding send-off given to the campaign at the 1905 National American Woman Suffrage Association meeting at the Lewis and Clark Exposition in the summer of 1905.

On April 4, 1906, suffrage supporters from around the state gathered to network and gain Thumbnail image for Thumbnail image for Thumbnail for OR 4 3 1906 
14, sm.jpgmomentum for the final months of the 1906 campaign and to greet national leaders, including National American Woman Suffrage Association president Anna Howard Shaw. The day-long conference, held in Portland, brought major players in Oregon woman suffrage, labor, and reform groups from a variety of professions and occupations.

The afternoon session included talks by Mary A. Thompson, M.D. on "The Qualifications of Voters," "Woman and the Municipality," by Grace Watt Ross, president of the Portland Woman's Club, and "The Welfare of the Child," by Millie Trumbull.

At the evening session Abigail Scott Duniway addressed the group on "Marching on to Victory," and Sarah A. Evans, president of the Oregon State Federation of Women's Clubs, spoke on the "Advantage of the Ballot to the Clubwoman," Eva Emery Dye on "Oregon's Debt to Women," and Luema G. Johnson of the Union Label League and the State Federation of Labor on "The Wage-Earner." This session also included remarks by Clara Waldo of the Oregon Grange on "The Influence of the Woman on the Farm," and Esther Pohl, M.D. on "The Debt of the Professional Woman to the Pioneer Suffragists."

Organizers hoped to bring together suffrage supporters from many parts of the state and representing different organizations and groups of women to enhance their appeal for votes for women that June. 

1870: First Oregon suffrage organizations

1878: All Oregon taxpayers, regardless of gender, may vote in school elections

1878: Married women’s property act passes Oregon legislature

1884: Woman suffrage on ballot 1st time

1896: Idaho women achieve the vote

1900: Woman suffrage on ballot 2nd time

1906: Woman suffrage on ballot 3rd time

1908: Woman suffrage on ballot 4th time

1910: Woman suffrage on ballot 5th time

1910: Washington State women achieve the vote

1911: California women achieve the vote

1912: Oregon women achieve the vote

1914: Marian Towne, elected to Oregon Legislature from Jackson County

1920: Nineteenth Amendment ratified

1936: Nan Wood Honeyman, first Oregon woman elected to U.S. Congress, House of Representatives

1977: Norma Paulus elected Secretary of State, first woman elected to statewide office

1982: Betty Roberts first woman to serve on the Oregon Supreme Court

1990: Barbara Roberts first woman elected governor of Oregon

2012: Oregon Woman Suffrage Centennial

2020: Nineteenth Amendment Centennial