In 1915 three women drove across the country in an Overland Six automobile, from San Francisco to DC. They carried with them 500,000 signatures on a petition to Congress and President Wilson, demanding an amendment to the US Constitution enfranchising women. In the group were two Swedes from Rhode Island,  Despite their considerable contributions to making the trip happen at all, and with success, because they were immigrants.  As a result, they are often left out of descriptions of this trip.

In 2015 Maine author Anne Gas was so inspired by the story she retraced this famous trip. Join us in the Nordic Hall as Anne retells the story of her great-grandmother and the other important women that took part in the suffrage movement.

Saturday, March 24th | 1pm | $5 suggested donation; free for SCC members

ABOUT ANNE:

Anne B. Gass is Florence Brooks Whitehouse’s great-granddaughter. She is the author of Voting Down the Rose: Florence Brooks Whitehouse and Maine’s Fight for Woman Suffrage, published in 2014. Her article, “Florence Brooks Whitehouse and Maine’s Vote to Ratify Women’s Suffrage in 1919,” appeared in the Maine History Journal in 2012. Gass lectures regularly on Florence Brooks Whitehouse and Maine suffrage history at conferences, historical societies, libraries, and for other groups. Along with other volunteers she is helping the Maine State Museum to develop an exhibit in honor of the 100-year anniversary of Maine’s ratification of the 19th Amendment giving women the right to vote.

In her professional life, Gass has continued her great-grandmother’s activist tradition. She is the founder and principal of ABG Consulting LLC, a small business devoted to supporting nonprofits, local and state governments, and foundations in their efforts to help people in need build stable, productive lives. Her clients create affordable housing and provide programming for people who are low income, homeless, are refugees, have mental illness, or incarcerated.