The Progressive era was an era in which many people were standing up for what they believed in and starting organizations dedicated to what they wanted to change. Problems were being addressed mainly in the labor work force, women’s suffrage and in African Americans lives. Thankfully a lot of great women were in this era, and made such great impacts on women today. Here are just a few of women who impacted us and our lives.
Florence Kelley was born in Pennsylvania; Kelley’s parents were both activists which led to their support for her passion which was women’s rights. Kelley worked for Jane Addams, she then had the responsibility to investigate the labor industry. Kelley tried to encourage fair treatment in the labor industry but she never had the amount of education to win the law suits. Which her downfalls, that encouraged her to become a lawyer. She went to law school and got a degree from Northwestern University. In the beginning of her career, she first started to advocate for the National Consumers League (NCL). Which basically means she wanted to create shorter work days for employees and also a little bit of a pay raise. With time she started to notice that the race factor was predominantly white. Kelley switched gears and started to focus on African Americans. She saw what conditions they were at in their work life and deicide to help organize the (NAACP) National Advancement of Colored People. She spent some time helping them to get treated humane and not worked to the bone. As she was working on this she also found out about child labor. She looked into it and saw that children were being overworked and kids weren’t able to be kids because they were always working. So Kelley founded the National Labor Committee. In which she effectively was able to band the law. Around that same time, she grew another love for women’s suffrage. She became the vice president for the organization called the National Americans Women Suffrage Association. Which helped women with their voting rights. Florence Kelley, in her early years of being an activist was not taken serious. She lost a few law suits and with time she became one of the most influential woman in history. In this age I don’t feel historians give her the credit she deserves, historians don’t touch much upon women who have impacted society.
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Jane Addams was born in Illinois, she also had a father who was very invested in social missions. In her adult life Addams, began her own mission which she had a Burdon for women. She wanted to teach them basic educated skills. So she went to the poorest place in her neighborhood and bought a house. “She bought a house in one of Chicago’s poorest immigrant communities and established it as Hull House, offering a range of social and cultural services for the neighborhood” (Opdycke, 77). She was so selfless that she began her own community center in which women were able to come get basic help, as for jobs, language, etc. this center was for immigrants as well. She cared so much about every type of women. She also took part in the National Child Labor Committee, she was also known for abolishing child labor. In the early 1900’s she became the first women to become an officer in the National American Women’s Suffrage Association. With that she was able to help women get rights to vote and also wanting to bring peace for all. Society in her time was not a fan of her, people were mean to her and wrote harsh newspapers on her. She was not given the credit in her early stages. Later in life she was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. Which was amazing because she finally got credited for all she had done. This woman gets a lot of credit, she did so much, she did whatever she wanted and she didn’t care who talked about her, whether it be good or bad. She will always be looked at as one of the great women to ever live. Her contributions did tremendous change for women.
Elizabeth Cady Stanton, born in New York. She as well came from a very wealthy family, she had really good education and when older she started to be interested in being an activist for anti-slavery movement. Along with that she also invested her time in in married women, and women’s suffrage. One of the great things that she did was advocate for the 13th Amendment. In which says that it will end slavery. Shortly after the 14th and 15th amendment came out which said that black men were able to vote. She then got upset and spoke out that women should also be given the right to vote. Before her dead she wrote a speech and something stood out to me which said: “Secondly, if we consider her as a citizen, as a member of her great nation, she must have the same rights as all the other members, according to the fundamental principles of our government” (Ward and Burns,189). Shortly after she was able to overcome that law and in 1919 women were granted to be able to vote. All thanks to Elizabeth and Susan. Unfortunately, she was not able to witness because she died a handful years before they passed this law. Society always viewed her as a very prominent and important woman to the rights of women. She was one of the reasons why women have rights today. Historians do give her the credit she deserves, she is mentioned a lot and was a huge advocate for women and their rights.
All these three ladies were very impactful to their era and our era right now. They stood up for what they believed in and made huge changes in our society.
Work cited
- Opdycke, Sandra. The Routledge Historical Atlas of Women in America. Routledge, 2000.
- Burns, K., Ward, G. Not Ourselves Alone the Story of Elizabeth C Stanton and Susan B Anthony. Knopf, 2002.
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