Iris Calderhead

Iris Calderhead
Iris Calderhead
Iris Calderhead and other suffragists in a march.
Iris Calderhead and other suffragists in a march.

Iris Calderhead (b. 1889?) was a suffragist and organizer in the National Woman's Party. She was the daughter of William A. Calderhead, the congressional representative for Kansas' 5th District from 1895 to 1911. She graduated from the University of Kansas and then completed a graduate degree at Bryn Mawr College.

Activism

Calderhead became involved in the women's suffrage movement after meeting Doris Stevens and Lucy Burns, leaders of the Congressional Union, in New York City. Her fist assignment in 1915 was to help organize the Union's exhibit at the Panama–Pacific International Exposition and the Women's Voter Convention. [1] Calderhead was willing to travel extensively to advocate for suffrage. "I came a long way to work for the union because national suffrage seems to me the biggest political issue before the country," she explained. "I think I ought to be able to convince others of this."[2] In August, 1916, the NWP dispatched teams to states that had already granted suffrage to mobilize support for a federal amendment for women's suffrage.[3] Calderhead was sent to Arizona, which had granted women the right to vote in 1912, along with Vivian Pierce, Ella Thompson, Helen Todd, and Rose Winslow.[4] The group met resistance from the Democratic Party, which opposed women's suffrage and Calderhead reported that members of the party tried to ban the suffragists' meetings.[5]

On July 14, 1917, Calderhead was arrested for picketing the White House and served three days in jail.[6]

From January to June 1918, Calderhead conducted a speaking tour through Colorado, Massachusetts, Ohio, and Pennsylvania.

After Suffrage

Calderhead was married to John Brisben Walker (d. 1931). During the Great Depression she was an official at the Consumers' Counsel Division of the Agricultural Adjustment Administration[7] and authored the 1936 report, Consumer Services of Government Agencies.

The Women's Voter Convention, San Francisco, 1915.
The Women's Voter Convention, San Francisco, 1915.

References

  1. ↑ "Marin Journal 9 September 1915 — California Digital Newspaper Collection". cdnc.ucr.edu. Retrieved 2016-07-15.
  2. ↑ "The Milwaukee Journal - Google News Archive Search". news.google.com. Retrieved 2016-07-15.
  3. ↑ "Suffragists Timeline: 1916". groups.ischool.berkeley.edu. Retrieved 2016-07-14.
  4. ↑ "DETAILED CHRONOLOGY NATIONAL WOMAN'S PARTY HISTORY" (PDF). Library of Congress. Retrieved July 15, 2016.
  5. ↑ Adams, Katherine H.; Keene, Michael L. (2007). Alice Paul and the American Suffrage Campaign. Champaign: University of Illinois Press. p. 151. ISBN 9780252074714.
  6. ↑ Stevens, Doris (1920). Jailed for freedom. New York,. p. 369.
  7. ↑ Scroop, Daniel Mark (2009). Mr. Democrat : Jim Farley, the New Deal and the Making of Modern American Politics. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press. p. 86. ISBN 9780472099306.


This article is issued from Wikipedia - version of the 9/26/2016. The text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike but additional terms may apply for the media files.