Women began working for suffrage in South Carolina as early as the Reconstruction era.
Women you’ll meet in this episode:
- Elizabeth Timothy, first woman newspaper publisher;
- The Rollin sisters – Frances, Katherine, Charlotte, Marie Louise and Florence – free women of color from Charleston who fought for universal voting rights;
- Virginia Durant Young, suffragist from Fairfax and publisher of the Fairfax Enterprise;
- Eulalie Salley, a suffragist from Aiken who devised clever events in support of voting rights, who became statewide chair of the League of Women Voters after the adoption of the 19th Amendment, and who was at the Governor’s side when South Carolina finally ratified the amendment in 1969;
- Susan Pringle Frost, Charleston suffragist; and
- The Pollitzer sisters – Carrie, Mabel and Anita – of Charleston who worked first with the Equal Suffrage League of South Carolina, and then the National Women’s Party for the ratification of the 19th Amendment. While Carrie and Mabel worked in South Carolina, Anita joined the national headquarters in Washington and traveled the nation in support of state ratifications of the amendment.