Georgia steadfastly opposed women’s suffrage, so no one ever expected the first woman in the U.S. Senate to be from Georgia. But that’s what happened on this day in 1922. Rebecca Latimer was born in 1835 near Decatur. She married William Felton and was actively involved in his political career as a state legislator and […]
She was partially deaf, suffered from depression, and had no children of her own, yet she founded the Girl Scouts of America. Juliette Gordon Low was born into wealth in Savannah in 1860. Two accidents in her twenties left her partially deaf and led to bouts of depression. At 26, Gordon married William Low, a […]
A Ramblin’ Wreck is more than just a snappy nickname for Georgia Tech. It speaks to the very reason the school was created in the first place: to help bring the Industrial Revolution to Georgia. The Georgia School of Technology began with $65,000 in state funding and 84 students. At first, the school was narrowly […]
She dedicated her life to education but had only one year of formal schooling herself. Martha Berry was born in Alabama and moved to Rome, Georgia, as a baby. Home-schooled by a governess, Martha Berry attended finishing school in Baltimore for less than a year. Back home in northwest Georgia, a chance encounter with two […]
It was a giant step forward for Georgia women on this day in 1922. Viola Napier of Bibb County and Bessie Kempton Crowell of Fulton County became the first women elected to the General Assembly. They hit the milestone only two years after the Nineteenth Amendment granted women the vote. Napier was a schoolteacher and […]
Its beautiful campus has hosted more than twenty movies and TV shows. It opened in 1889 as the Decatur Female Seminary. As Agnes Scott College, it’s become a preeminent institution of women’s higher education. In 1888, Frank Gaines became pastor of the Decatur Presbyterian Church. With church support, he founded the seminary the next year […]
One of the world’s greatest woman golfers, Mae Louise Suggs, was born in Atlanta. Comedian Bob Hope nicknamed her “Miss Sluggs.” Golfer Ben Hogan called her the “sweet–swinging Georgia Miss.” Louise Suggs grew up in a sporting family. She began playing golf at age ten and won eight championships during her amateur career. In her […]
An ambulance driver, a lawyer, and one of the first women elected to Congress from Georgia — all stops along the way for Helen Douglas Mankin. Mankin was the daughter of two lawyers. She drove an ambulance in France during World War I, then graduated from Atlanta Law School, which her father helped found. She […]
Vocabulary – Mary Latimer McLendon Prohibition Noun in the United States, the period between 1919 and 1933 during which the manufacture, sale, and transportation of alcoholic beverages was forbidden by the 18th Amendment Suffragist Noun a supporter of the extension of the right to vote to a particular group, especially to women, or to all […]
Vocabulary – Justice Clarence Thomas Affirmative Action Conservative Controversial Devout Encountering Harassment Seminary Glossary Affirmative Action: noun; referring to various government policies that aim to increase the proportion of African Americans, women, and other minorities in jobs and educational institutions historically dominated by white men. Conservative: adjective; disposed to preserve existing conditions and institutions or […]
