SERVICE INTERRUPTION: Thursday, August 28 at 9 pm through Wednesday, September 3 at 9 am as Vernon Area Public Library joins our consortium. During this time our app, calendar and some additional online resources will be temporarily unavailable. You can still check out materials, and no items will become due during this time. Full service is expected to resume on Wednesday, September 3.
August 26th is the day we celebrate Women’s Equality Day.
Ratified by Congress in 1973, Women’s Equality Day memorializes the adoption of the Nineteenth Amendment in 1920. The Nineteenth Amendment granted voting rights to many women across the United States and was a hard-won victory that signaled the changing times that were to come.
While the Nineteenth Amendment steered the country towards the right direction, not all women were granted the right to vote.
The Voting Rights Act of 1965 outlawed common practices that disenfranchised many minority groups such as poll taxes, literacy tests, and voting restrictions placed by local governments.
Once the Voting Rights Act was passed, voter registration and turnout immediately increased across the country as racial barriers were removed.
The fight for women’s rights and suffrage didn’t begin in 1920 and certainly didn’t end in 1973 with the acknowledgement of Women’s Equality Day.
Activists across the United States and the globe continue to fight for equal rights and protections for women.
The right to vote is one of many that women are owed – the right to safety, the right to work, the right to health care, the right to own land, the right to be free of subjugation by both the larger systems at play and the people around them.
Learning from those who came before and those who are currently working towards women’s liberation is a great way to observe Women’s Equality Day!
“The Vote tells the dramatic story of the hard-fought campaign waged by American women for the right to vote, a transformative cultural and political movement that resulted in the largest expansion of voting rights in U.S. history.”
"An essential documentary about the birth of the women's liberation movement. Beginning in the late 1960s, featuring never-seen before archival footage and new interviews She's beautiful when she's angry tells the story of one of the most important social movements of the 20th century, bringing to light the efforts of lesser-known activists, including the Boston authors of Our bodies, ourselves, the Chicago Women's Liberation Union, and grassroots organizations across the country who played a pivotal role in the struggle"--Container.
Examines the complex relationship between suffragist leader Alice Paul and President Woodrow Wilson, revealing the life-risking measures that Paul and her supporters endured to gain voting rights for American women.
Explores the full scope of the movement to win the vote for women through portraits of its leaders and activists, including Lucretia Mott, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, Matilda Joslyn Gage, Sojourner Truth, Carrie Chapman Catt, Alice Paul, and Ida B. Wells-Barnett.
"Comprised of historical texts spanning two centuries with commentary on each period by the editor, this book covers the major issues and figures involved in the women's suffrage movement with a special focus on diversity, incorporating race, class, and gender. The writings of such figures as Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony are featured alongside accounts of Native American women and African American suffragists such as Sarah Mapps Douglas and Harriet Purvis"-- Provided by publisher.
"According to conventional wisdom, American women's campaign for the vote began with the Seneca Falls convention of 1848 and ended with the ratification of the Nineteenth Amendment in 1920. But this women's movement was an overwhelmingly white one, and it secured the constitutional right to vote for white women, not for all women. In Vanguard, acclaimed historian Martha Jones offers a sweeping history of African American women's political lives in America, recounting how they fought for, won, and used the right to the ballot and how they fought against both racism and sexism"-- Provided by publisher.
"It's 1913, and on the surface, Laura Lyons couldn't ask for more out of life--her husband is the superintendent of the New York Public Library. But Laura wants more, and applies to the Columbia Journalism School. She discovers the Heterodoxy Club--a radical, all-female group, and soon Laura finds herself questioning her traditional role as wife and mother. But when valuable books are stolen back at the library, she's forced to confront her shifting priorities head on. Eighty years later, Sadie Donovan struggles with the legacy of her grandmother, at her dream job as a curator at the New York Public Library. But the job quickly becomes a nightmare when rare manuscripts, notes, and books begin disappearing from the library's famous Berg Collection. Things unexpectedly become personal when the investigation leads Sadie to some unwelcome truths about her own family heritage"-- Adapted from publisher description.
"1890, Atlanta. By day, seventeen-year-old Jo Kuan works as a lady's maid for the cruel Caroline Payne, the daughter of one of the wealthiest men in Atlanta. But by night, Jo moonlights as the pseudonymous author of a newspaper advice column for 'the genteel Southern lady'"-- Provided by publisher.
A beautifully illustrated celebration of the brave campaigners who fought for women's right to vote. Discover that it was never illegal for women to vote in Ecuador, or how 40,000 Russian women marched through St Petersburg demanding their rights. Find out how one Canadian woman changed opinions with a play, and Kuwaiti women protested via text message. And learn that women climbed mountains, walked a lion through the streets of Paris, and starved themselves, all in the name of having a voice. Tracing its history from New Zealand at the end of the 19th century, follow this empowering movement as it spread from Oceania to Europe and the Americas, then Africa and Asia up to the present day. Meet the women who rioted, rallied and refused to give up.
"There are 574 federally recognized nations with tribal sovereignty in the United States. Tribal sovereignty means that these nations must be honored as distinct political entities. In addition to the rights granted to them by those nations, their citizens are guaranteed civil rights as citizens of the United States, such as the right to vote, the right to use government services and public spaces, the right to education, and the right to a fair trial. But for many Native Americans, it has been a struggle to have these rights affirmed and recognized. Trace the history of the struggle for Native rights from the 1924 Indian Citizenship Act to the current effort for Tribal identification cards to be accepted at US voting stations. Hear the stories of the Indigenous activists who fought for these rights and those who are still fighting to protect them"-- Page 4 of cover.
"For African American women, the fight for the right to vote was only one battle. An eye-opening book that tells the important, overlooked story of black women as a force in the suffrage movement--when fellow suffragists did not accept them as equal partners in the struggle."--Publisher's description.
As an elderly woman, Lillian recalls that her great-great-grandparents were sold as slaves in front of a courthouse where only rich white men were allowed to vote, then the long fight that led to her right--and determination--to cast her ballot since the Voting Rights Act gave every American the right to vote.
