Much will be expected from the one who has been given much.
Luke 12:48 – J.B.Phillips New Testament
What drives a woman such as Susan B. Anthony to devote her life to improving the lives of others? Many women are born or marry into families with resources and connections to people of influence. Countless women come from families that value education for their daughters as well as their sons. Yet, only a few in any generation muster the long-term dedication of a Susan B. Anthony to use these assets to do so much for so many. Even fewer continue to advocate for others once they are persecuted, criticized, and blocked at every turn. Susan B. Anthony’s dedication came at the cost of great personal sacrifices and challenges. What factors form someone like Susan B. Anthony? What drove her to persevere against forces committed to stopping her? I got a glimpse of her life while on our 2021 road trip when I took the tour of her Rochester, NY home.
Childhood Factors
Susan B. Anthony was born in 1820 as the second child of a Massachusetts Quaker family that eventually would include seven children. Her parents believed their daughters, as well as their sons, needed good educations. Her school teacher did not agree with their decision. Susan was told to leave the school as the class progressed from learning basic reading and writing to mathematics. Her father started his own school in their home and Anthony’s studies continued.
Her father also gave her a job at the mill he established and paid her for her work. She spent her income on a set of coffee cups for her mother. The family spent their evenings together in the family parlor discussing the events of their days and current events. A significant factor in shaping Susan B. Anthony’s life was her parents’ determination to provide her an education. Another was her father’s willingness to let her experience the satisfaction of earning and spending her own money when she was still a child.
On the Job Training
When Susan B. Anthony was fifteen, she began teaching younger pupils in her father’s home school. At seventeen she moved in with a neighboring family to teach their children and help with household chores. She then attended a boarding school in Hamilton, PA. However, the 1837 economic depression forced her father to close his mill. She had to drop out of school, return home, and join her family in selling many of their personal things to pay their bills.
Now a young woman, she needed to find a way to support herself, and help her family. This she did by taking a teaching position at a Quaker boarding school in Rochelle, New York. Teaching was about the only position open to women in the 1800s, and only for single women. Women usually moved from their parents’ home to their husband’s home. Anthony wasn’t convinced she wanted to be anyone’s wife. Her experiences in leadership roles as a teacher were another factor in shaping the future life Anthony would lead.
Critical Life Decisions
Susan and Guelma were good friends as well as sisters; until Guelma got engaged to Aaron McLean. After that Susan no longer heard from her sister. Longing to communicate with Guelma, Susan wrote to her future brother-in-law. Though it is highly unlikely he meant to do so, his response no doubt helped set the stage for Anthony’s decision to stay single and focus her attention on political issues. He wrote, “Sisters are always twice as much trouble and bother as they are worth.” He may have thought he as being playful, but for Susan it was a glimpse into what could be her own future and she wanted no part of it.
Once married, Guelma no longer owned anything of her own. As was the situation for all wives of that era, she could not engage in any contracts on her own, had to defer to her husband for decisions impacting her life, and had no right to divorce her husband. That was not a life Susan B. Anthony was willing to live. When her sisters went to the altar to marry, she went to Canajoharie, New York to teach. She lived first with an uncle and later her cousin Margaret.
Choosing to remain single was another step forward on Anthony’s path to a life as an advocate for other people’s rights.
From Teacher to Political Activist
Teaching paid her living expenses, but Anthony’s real passion was engaging in political issues around temperance and slavery. Some of her family still supported slavery, but not Anthony. She was an abolitionist who believed that “the day will come when they must acknowledge their stupidity.” She gave her first public speech March 1, 1849 to 200 people at a supper for the Daughters of Temperance. It was her way of trying to assist women married to alcoholic husbands. Wives were powerless to address the poverty generated when a husband’s pay went to the bar rather than the grocery store.
Her cousin Margaret died and Anthony returned to the family home, now in Rochester, New York. Among her father’s many friends who visited was Frederick Douglass. A formerly enslaved man, he’d become a great abolitionist. The two spent many hours talking about helping people denied their human rights by virtue of their skin color or gender.
Her career as a women’s suffrage leader was born in July 1848 when she attended a conference in Seneca Falls, New York. The conference theme addressed the radical idea that women should be given the right to vote. Until then, she’d never entertained the notion of fighting for the right to vote. She wanted to learn more.
I’ll have more about her influence in the next blog. The statue pictured in this blog is Susan B. Anthony having tea with Frederick Douglass. It is located in a pocket park a few yards away from the Anthony home.
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