List of Kentucky suffragists

This is a list of Kentucky suffragists, suffrage groups and others associated with the cause of women's suffrage in Kentucky.

Groups

• Anderson County Woman's Suffrage League, created in 1913. ^[1]
• Columbus Equal Rights Association, founded in 1897. ^[2]
• Covington Colored Organization, formed in 1895. ^[3]
• Fayette County Equal Rights Association, created in January 1888. ^[4]
• Kentucky Equal Rights Association, formed on November 22, 1888. ^[5]
• Kentucky Federation of Women's Clubs. ^[6]
• Kentucky Woman Suffrage Association (KWSA). ^[6]
• Kenton County Equal Rights Association. ^[7]
• Laurel County Equal Rights Association. ^[8]
• Louisville Equal Rights Association (LERA), formed in 1889, later changed name to the Woman Suffrage Association of Louisville in 1908. ^[9]
• Madison County Equal Rights Association. ^[10]
• The Men's League. ^[11]
• National Association of Colored Women's Clubs. ^[12]
• Woman's Christian Temperance Union. ^[13]

Suffragists

Margaret Weissinger Castleman

Marian Hord Hubbard and son, October 1915

• Susan Look Avery (Louisville). ^[14]
• Lizzie Bates (Louisville). ^[15]
• Frances Estill Beauchamp (1860–1923) – Kentucky temperance activist, social reformer, lecturer, suffragist. ^[16]
• Cornelia Beach (Louisville). ^{[6] [14]}
• Sarah "Sallie" Clay Bennett. ^[17]
• Madeline McDowell Breckinridge (1872–1920) – suffrage leader, one-time vice president of the National Woman Suffrage Association, one of Kentucky's leading Progressive reformers (Lexington). ^[14]
• Sophonisba Breckinridge (1866–1948) – activist, Progressive Era social reformer, social scientist and innovator in higher education (Lexington). ^[14]
• Mary E. Britton (Lexington). ^[6]
• Nannie Helen Burroughs (Louisville). ^[15]
• Sylvia Butcher (Louisville). ^[15]
• Alice Barbee Castleman (Louisville). ^[18]
• Margaret Weissinger Castleman (Louisville). ^[14]
• Laura Clay (Lexington). ^{[6] [14]}
• Mary Barr Clay (Richmond). ^[6]
• Sarah A. Corrington (Nicholasville). ^[14]
• Alice Crutcher (Louisville). ^[15]
• Cora De Sha Barnett (Louisville). ^[15]
• Ellen Battelle Dietrick. ^[19]
• Emma Dolfinger (Louisville). ^[14]
• Eugenia B. Farmer (Covington). ^[14]
• John G. Fee. ^[13]
• Mary Elliott Flanery. ^[20]
• Jennie Maas Flexner (Louisville). ^[21]
• Lucy Flint (Louisville). ^[15]
• Jessica Firth (Covington). ^[14]
• Bettiola Heloise Fortson (Hopkinsville). ^[14]
• Lucretia Gibson (Louisville). ^[15]
• Fannie Givens (Louisville). ^[15]
• Eliza Calvert Hall (pen name of Eliza Caroline "Lida" Calvert Obenchain) (1856–1935) – author, women's rights advocate. ^[22]
• Hattie Harris (Louisville). ^[15]
• Rachel Davis Harris (Louisville). ^[15]
• Ida Withers Harrison (Lexington). ^[14]
• Josephine Henry (Versailles). ^[14]
• Marian Hord Hubbard. ^[23]
• Sarah Gibson Humphreys (1830–1907) – author, suffragist. ^[24]
• Jessie Leigh Hutchinson (Lexington). ^[14]
• Rebecca Rosenthal Judah (Louisville). ^[14]
• Eliza Kellar (Louisville). ^[15]
• Dorothy Koger (Paducah). ^[14]
• Katherine G. Langley (Pikeville). ^[14]
• Mary Lafon (Louisville). ^[25]
• Maudellen Lanier (Louisville). ^[15]
• Caroline Leech (Louisville). ^[14]
• Eleanor Tarrant Little (Louisville). ^[25]
• Essie Mack (Louisville). ^[15]
• Patsie Sloan Martin (Louisville). ^[15]
• Angell Mengel (Louisville). ^[14]
• Georgia Moore (Louisville). ^[15]
• Georgia Nugent (Louisville). ^[14]
• Eliza Calvert Obenchain (Bowling Green). ^[14]
• Mary Virginia Cook Parrish (Louisville). ^[15]
• Virginia Penny (Louisville). ^[6]
• Josephine Fowler Post (Paducah). ^[14]
• Mary Creegan Roark (Lexington). ^[14]
• Ella Robinson (Louisville). ^[15]
• Sarah Hardin Sawyer. ^[13]
• Patty Blackburn Semple (Louisville). ^[14]
• Isabella H. Shepard (Frankfort). ^[14]
• Lucy Wilmot Smith (Louisville). ^[26]
• Lavinia B. Sneed (Louisville). ^[15]
• Louise Southgate (Covington). ^[14]
• Ida Stanley (Arlington). ^[14]
• Mamie Steward (Louisville). ^[15]
• Christine Bradley South. ^[27]
• Ellen Taylor (Louisville). ^[15]
• Mary Florence Taney (Newport). ^[14]
• Carolyn Verhoeff (Louisville). ^[14]
• Mary Verhoeff (Louisville). ^[14]
• John H. Ward (Louisville). ^[28]
• Mary Fitzbutler Waring (Louisville). ^[15]
• Martha Webster (Louisville). ^[15]
• Bertha Whedbee (Louisville). ^[15]
• Alice D. White (Louisville). ^[9]
• Harvey W. Wiley. ^[11]
• Artishia Gilbert-Wilkerson (Louisville). ^[15]
• Emma Woerner. ^[29]

Politicians supporting women's suffrage

• William Lindsay. ^[19]
• Edwin P. Morrow. ^[30]

Suffragists campaigning in Kentucky

• Jane Addams. ^[31]
• Susan B. Anthony. ^[32]
• Carrie Chapman Catt. ^[33]
• Emma Smith DeVoe. ^[33]
• Max Eastman. ^[34]
• William H. Fineshriber. ^[35]
• Margaret Foley. ^[36]
• Mary Garrett Hay. ^[33]
• Lucretia Mott. ^[37]
• Emmeline Pankhurst. ^[34]
• Emmeline Pethick-Lawrence. ^[34]
• Rosika Schwimmer. ^[34]
• Anna Howard Shaw. ^[13]
• Ethel Snowden. ^[38]
• Elizabeth Cady Stanton. ^[32]
• Lucy Stone. ^[37]

Anti-suffragists

• Henry Watterson. ^[39]
• Augustus E. Willson. ^[40]
• Clarence Woods. ^[40]

References

1. "Wallace Moore Bartlett". Humanities and Social Sciences Online. Retrieved January 18, 2022.
2. "Mrs. E.W. Avery". Humanities and Social Sciences Online. Retrieved January 18, 2022.
3. Goan 2020, p. 74.
4. Fuller 1975, p. 25.
5. Fuller 1975, p. 32.
6. "Kentucky and the 19th Amendment". U.S. National Park Service. Retrieved January 18, 2022.
7. Hollingsworth 2020, p. 37.
8. Goan 2020, p. 48.
9. Allen 2020, p. 64.
10. Fuller 1975, p. 22-23.
11. "Women Ready". The Courier-Journal. November 30, 1913. p. 33. Retrieved December 1, 2025– via Newspapers.com.
12. Goan 2020, p. 78.
13. Anthony 1902, p. 666.
14. "Kentucky Suffragists". Kentucky Woman Suffrage Project. Archived from the original on November 3, 2018. Retrieved January 18, 2022.
15. "African American Women and Suffrage in Louisville". ArcGIS StoryMaps. October 22, 2020. Retrieved January 19, 2022.
16. Kerr, Charles (1922). History of Kentucky: Discovery and exploration by the English of the Ohio country. Vol. 3. American Historical Society. p. 138. Retrieved July 30, 2024. This article incorporates text from this source, which is in the public domain.
17. Fuller 1975, p. 23.
18. Qaddura, Heather. "Biography of Alice Barbee Castleman, 1842-1926". Biographical Database of NAWSA Suffragists, 1890-1920– via Alexander Street.
19. Anthony 1902, p. 668.
20. Hollingsworth, Randolph (June 24, 2020). "Mary E. Flanery c1921". H-Kentucky | H-Net. Retrieved May 9, 2022.
21. Allen 2021, p. 33.
22. "Eliza Calvert Hall, 1856-1935". KY Historical Society. Retrieved August 8, 2024.
23. "Will Democrats Endorse Submission of Woman Suffrage?". The Jackson Times. September 10, 1915. p. 2. Retrieved December 3, 2025– via Newspapers.com.
24. Senters, Melinda (March 13, 2019). "Sarah Gibson Humphreys (1830-1907): Writer, Speaker, Suffragist". H-Kentucky. Retrieved September 15, 2024.
25. Allen 2020, p. 60.
26. "Suffragists in Kentucky". Turning Point Suffragist Memorial. Retrieved January 19, 2022.
27. "Our State President". The State Journal. February 25, 1917. p. 25. Retrieved December 3, 2025– via Newspapers.com.
28. Knott, Claudia (August 22, 2010). "Louisville Women Spurred Right to Vote". The Courier-Journal. pp. H1. Retrieved March 9, 2022– via Newspapers.com. and "Vote Suffrage History". pp. H4.
29. "Big Increase in Membership". Lexington Herald-Leader. November 22, 1913. p. 6. Retrieved March 9, 2022– via Newspapers.com.
30. Harper 1922, p. 210.
31. Wheeler 1993, p. 55.
32. Goan 2020, p. 19.
33. Anthony 1902, p. 667.
34. Harper 1922, p. 208.
35. Allen 2021, p. 37.
36. "Foley, Margaret, 1875-1957. Papers of Margaret Foley, 1847-1968". Arthur and Elizabeth Schlesinger Library on the History of Women in America. Retrieved August 7, 2024.
37. Goan 2020, p. 10.
38. "Article clipped from The Courier-Journal". Books and Pamphlets on Woman's Suffrage. November 7, 1909. p. 16. Retrieved December 3, 2025– via Newspapers.com.
39. Goan 2020, p. 24.
40. "Resolutions". Lexington Herald-Leader. November 17, 1907. p. 3. Retrieved March 9, 2022– via Newspapers.com.

Sources

• Allen, Ann Taylor (Spring 2021). "Jewish Women as Social Reformers and Suffragists: Louisville, Kentucky 1890-1920" . Ohio Valley History. 21 (1): 22–47 – via Project MUSE.
• Allen, Ann Taylor (Spring 2020). "Woman Suffrage and Progressive Reform in Louisville, 1908-1920" . Ohio Valley History. 20 (1): 54–78 – via Project Muse.
• Anthony, Susan B. (1902). Anthony, Susan B.; Harper, Ida Husted (eds.). The History of Woman Suffrage. Vol. 4. Indianapolis: The Hollenbeck Press.
• Fuller, Paul E. (1975). Laura Clay and the Woman's Rights Movement. Lexington, Kentucky: The University Press of Kentucky. ISBN   0813112990.
• Goan, Melanie Beals (2020). A Simple Justice: Kentucky Women Fight for the Vote . Lexington, Kentucky: The University Press of Kentucky. ISBN   9780813180175 – via Oxford Academic.
• Harper, Ida Husted (1922). The History of Woman Suffrage. New York: J.J. Little & Ives Company.
• Hollingsworth, Randolph (Spring 2020). "African American Women Voters in Lexington's School Suffrage Times, 1895-1902: Race Matters in the History of the Kentucky Woman Suffrage Movement" . Ohio Valley History. 20 (1): 30–53 – via Project MUSE.
• Wheeler, Marjorie Spruill (1993). New Women of the New South: The Leaders of the Woman Suffrage Movement in the Southern States. New York: Oxford University Press. ISBN   0195075838.