Posted on by Jean Lee Cole

Truth and reconciliation

This post from Rector Grey Maggiano at the Memorial Episcopal Church website hits close to home.

New deacon Natalie Conway, they recently discovered, was descended from people who had formerly been enslaved by Memorial Episcopal’s founding rector, David Ridgely Howard, whose family owned the Hampton plantation north of where Towson Town Center mall stands today.

This discovery inspired some 50 members of the congregation, including Deacon Conway, to travel together to Hampton plantation last week to learn more about their collective history.

Parishioners of Memorial Episcopal and St. Katherine of Alexandria churches tour the grounds of the Hampton plantation, formerly owned by Memorial rector David Ridgely Howard. Photo courtesy Memorial Episcopal Church, Baltimore.

This history intersects with the WLCB because David Ridgely Howard was the half-brother of Margaretta Sophia Howard Ridgely, the mother of Eliza Ridgely, first secretary of the WLCB. Eliza grew up at Hampton and later lived in the Mt. Vernon neighborhood, just around the block from founding member Hester Dorsey.

A number of other Club members also attended Memorial Episcopal–during a time when the church fervently supported segregation. In fact, Clara Love and Katie Kazmierski spent some hours poring through church records early on in our research, when we were trying to find WLCB club members and where they lived.

As we’ve discovered, the history of the WLCB is intertwined with some ugly, long-hidden (and carefully hidden) truths about Baltimore and racial attitudes in the United States as a whole. The present-day parishioners’ visit to Hampton is a step toward reconciling this past with a more hopeful future. Read Grey’s post here.

Posted on by Ellen Roussel

Documenting the only voting these women were allowed to take part in because they lived, and we continue to live, in a patriarchal society

Throughout the first three seasons, the Woman’s Literary Club has gone from a small gathering of women to a quite larger, established organization. It is easy to forget (as I am often guilty of) that this club of women is one of the first of its kind. During this period of history, there were not many clubs of only female participants, and certainly not many partaking in intellectual and cultural discussions. As the researcher who has taken over the first three seasons of the Club, I have had a very clear window into all that has taken place to establish the Club as an actual organization of women. At times, it has been tedious to transcribe all the voting the women have taken part in throughout the Club’s run, from voting on various Articles while establishing their Constitution, to voting on the membership of proposed women, it seems that nothing can take place within the Club without a vote.

Despite the tedious work that this sometimes presents, it is so so important to realize how monumental the act of voting is for these women. The Club is formed in 1890, nearly thirty years before women are allowed the right to vote in the United States. The Woman’s Literary Club is, for all members throughout the 1890-1920 lifetime of the Club, the only medium through which these women can assert their voices and opinions through voting. It is impossible not to wonder whether women being afforded more liberties within the United States has something to do with the disintegration of the Club.

It was not until I reached the third season of the Club that I noticed any serious dissent between the women in regards to voting. On October 11, 1892, at the 60th general meeting of the WLC, the women met to discuss and vote upon whether or not the Club should elect a Corresponding Secretary to the Board. To set the context, this is after Eliza Ridgely, the previous Secretary, stepped down from her position. Lydia Crane has taken over the role of Recording Secretary, but has refused to take responsibility for the correspondence part of the Secretary’s duties. Therefore, the topic has been broached to elect a Corresponding Secretary to act as a counterpart to Lydia Crane’s position of Recording Secretary. Eliza Ridgely has stressed on numerous occasions how necessary it is to have a Corresponding Secretary, which makes me think that Eliza stepped down from her role because it simply became too much work for one person to handle.

Several women proposed that a Corresponding Secretary be appointed by the President and act as the President’s assistant. However, Miss Edith Duer “made some very decided objections to the motion” which, in WLC speak, basically means shit went down. Edith Duer’s main objection was to the point about the Corresponding Secretary being appointed by the President–this comes after the President was declared to have power likened to a governor. Several women spoke in support of Edith, including my girl Eliza Ridgely, who said the Corresponding Secretary should be voted in just like everyone else (you go girl!). The vote was taken orally, was not super conclusive, so they took a standing vote–14 for, 14 against.

The women were then reminded that the President of the United States got to choose his own Cabinet, and the President piped up that it would be super helpful to the wellbeing of the future club if she could pick her assistant, because why wouldn’t she want more power?

Votes were then taken to amend the Articles on Officer Duties to split the duties of the Recording and Corresponding Secretaries, to allow the President to nominate several people for the position to be voted upon by the Club, and then to allow the President to nominate people for the position for the Club to vote upon by ballot. None of these votes ended in the two-thirds majority to be passed. The meeting took so long, it seems, that several women “left the room” and the President motioned to move this discussion to a different day. It took several meetings and many votes before it was eventually decided that the President could make nominations, but that the position would be filled by Club votes.

This is the first instance I have seen in which dissent amongst Club members has been documented. This vote, which really comes down to how much power the President should be afforded, is really a pivotal moment in the history of the Club. This is the moment where several women–Edith Duer, Eliza Ridgely, and others–spoke up to ensure that things were done fairly. Unfortunately, women with the mindsets of Edith and Eliza still had to wait nearly thirty years before their opinions mattered in actual votes.

Posted on by Ellen Roussel

Ode to Eliza Ridgely

Today, I finished transcribing the last of the minutes recorded by Eliza Ridgely as Secretary; what a bittersweet moment in time this was for me.

Despite my original chagrin with Ridgely’s style of note-taking, I now feel as though I have learned and grown with Eliza for two seasons of the Woman’s Literary Club’s existence, and truly am sad to see her go.

Eliza’s work was characterized by a surprising lack of detail for most of the meetings’ happenings. With her, there was only a vague allusion to what events might have transpired during the actual meetings. Nonetheless, it is Eliza Ridgely who has painted the only picture of the Woman’s Literary Club that I have ever known.

At the end of the second season, Ridgely’s position was taken over by Lydia Crane, who was much less willing to do the amount of work that Eliza put into her position as Secretary. According to Crane, her stipulation for accepting the nomination as Secretary was that she would only be the Recording Secretary during the meetings, and not Corresponding and Recording Secretary as Eliza had been. This leads me to conclude that Eliza Ridgely went above and beyond for the Club. Way to go, girl.

What is mysterious to me, is why Eliza Ridgely refused to accept her nomination as Secretary in the third year of the Club’s existence. During the second season, Eliza began missing more and more meetings, with Lydia Crane filling in for her, for undisclosed reasons. I can only speculate as to why Eliza would have missed so many meetings and why she did not feel it within her ability to remain Secretary, while preferring to be a member of the Executive Board.

All I can say is that, Eliza, it was a pleasure getting to know you through your words and your writing and your descriptions (or lackthereof) over the past two seasons.