Beyond Suffrage: 100 Years of Progress

High Plains Library District is excited to partner with City of Greeley Museums, History Colorado, and the 2020 Women’s Vote Centennial Initiative to bring a traveling exhibit highlighting the suffrage movement. Beyond Suffrage: 100 Years of Progress will travel between libraries throughout our service area, educating and entertaining all.

The exhibit will be appearing at the locations below, accessible during all open hours.

November 2020
Glenn A. Jones M.D. Memorial Library, Johnstown

December 2020
Carbon Valley Regional Library

Colorado women gained the right to vote in 1893, a full 27 years before the ratification of the 19^th Amendment. It was not an easy victory, rather it was the result of decades of organized work, lobbying, and several failed campaigns. Unlike Wyoming and Utah, women’s suffrage, or right to vote, was not written into the constitution when Colorado became a state. Instead, women had to convince the majority of male voters in Colorado to support the cause.

The first real chance for Colorado women’s suffrage came in 1876, when the state’s constitution was created. Suffragists across the state lobbied legislators to leave the word “male” out of the voting rights section and extend voting rights to all Coloradans. Even though that effort failed, they enjoyed a different victory. The constitution included a section stating that women’s suffrage could become a law if it passed by a simple majority instead of two-thirds. Following that victory, they hoped they had enough support to pass the issue in 1877. Their effort failed. Sixteen years later, the measure once again appeared on the ballot and finally passed by a margin of less than ten percent.

But, Colorado women did not stop fighting for equality after winning the right to vote.

The traveling display features just a few of the Weld County women who used their education to claim their place in male dominated fields, empower others, and advocate for change.

The Women’s Suffrage Movement 
edited with an introduction by Sally Roesch Wagner ; foreword by Gloria Steinem

Why They Marched : Untold Stories of the Women Who Fought for the Right to Vote 
by Susan Ware

Fighting Chance : the Struggle Over Woman Suffrage and Black Suffrage in Reconstruction America 
by Faye E. Dudden

Amazons, Abolitionists, and Activists : a Graphic History of Women’s Fight for Their Rights 
by Mikki Kendall ; art by A. D’Amico ; colors by Shari Chankhamma ; letters by Erica Schultz

Suffragette 
Focus Features, Pathé, Film4 and BFI present in association with Ingenious Media ; with the participation of Canal + and Ciné + ; a Ruby Films production ; directed by Sarah Gavron ; written by Abi Morgan ; produced by Alison Owen and Faye Ward

Two Friends: Susan B. Anthony and Frederick Douglass