Celebrate Women’s Equality Day at 5 Historic Sites That Made Your Vote Possible ...Saudi Arabia

Women's Equality Day is August 26, marking the anniversary of the passage of the 19th Amendment, which guaranteed women’s right to vote in the United States.

It was the result of decades of work by activists throughout the country, which was then only 144 years old and 48 states large. When women achieved national suffrage, votes for women were already the law of the land in fifteen states—some of which may be surprising contenders for their early contribution to women’s voting rights. 

Whether you’re extending Semiquincentennial celebrations on the East Coast, joining Colorado as it observes 150 years of statehood, or looking for fresh destinations for a family summer vacation, these 5 places where women suffragettes made history are well worth exploring.

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Cheyenne, Wyoming 

Wyoming territory enfranchised women to vote and hold office a full 50 years before national women’s suffrage was achieved through the 19th Amendment. Government representatives hoped the unconventional experiment would attract more women settlers to gold-rush era Wyoming, as well as counter the newly enfranchised Black voters who were moving west after the Civil War. Although the move had its skeptics (Justice of the Peace R.S. Barrresigned in protest in December of 1869) the first woman appointed to public office proved them wrong.

Esther Hobart Morris was, in many ways, an unlikely candidate to make history. When she was appointed Justice of the Peace in South Pass City, a tiny gold mining town perched in the Wind River Mountains, she was already a widow, the middle-aged mother of two adult sons, and in a bad second marriage. What pushback she did receive was dealt with by her boys, whom she deputized as clerks. She also had her abusive husband arrested, which was no small statement in a rough and tumble frontier town where violence was routine.

Despite her lack of formal education or legal training and a decided lack of support from her abusive husband, she presided over 70 cases, only two of which were appealed during the eight months she held office. After her term was up, Morris left South Pass City and spent the next twenty years speaking at several suffrage conventions from San Francisco to Philadelphia. She ultimately settled in Cheyenne and lived there until her death in 1902. 

You can still visit Morris’ Cheyenne home today at 2114 Warren Avenue. It’s one of a pair of properties owned by Bella Fuoco Wood Fired Pizza, where you can order up duck wings, lemon berry mascarpone, and New York-style pies. In recent years, a historical marker was also added to the home, sharing more about Morris’ role in Wyoming and suffrage history. Visit the Capitol Building in Cheyenne to see a statue of Esther Morris by artist Avard Fairbanks.

Last but not least, South Pass City itself is a four-hour drive from Cheyenne along the Women's Suffrage Pathway. Tours are offered not only of the city itself, including the dugout home where Morris lived with her family, but also of the Carissa mine that drew miners in the first place. The area is surrounded by hiking trails,and there’s no shortage of outdoor adventures to be had in Lander, a town just north of South Pass City. Just ask the guides at the National Outdoor Leadership School, which offers classes for adults in backpacking, horsepacking, wilderness medicine, and more.

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Washington D.C. 

Although Wyoming was the first to pass women’s suffrage legislation, Washington D.C. was always the epicenter of the American movement for women voters. There are numerous museums and historic sites here where you can dig into the history of how women not only won the vote, but continued to agitate for equal rights and opportunities.

Start exploring in the Smithsonian’s extensive collections, including the American Women’s History Museum and the National Museum of African American History and Culture. The National Museum of Women in the Arts is another well worth visiting, though the scope goes well beyond women's suffrage. Upcoming exhibits include Routed West, a collection of quilts made by African Americans who moved out of the South during the second Great Migration in the mid-twentieth century.

Further afield, the Workhouse Arts Foundationin Lorton, Virginia offers workshops and classes on arts and crafts, from glass jewelry to stained glass, watercolor, figure drawing, mosaics, and more. The organization also offers wellness-focused activities, like sound baths, baby massage classes for mothers, and qigong classes for teens and adults. 

The wholesome programming is a stark contrast to the workhouse the foundation was named for. Once known as the Occoquan Work House, dozens of suffragettes were jailed here in 1917 after staging a peaceful protest outside the White House Gates. Despite relatively minor charges of traffic obstruction, guards at Occoquan subjected the suffragettes to sleep deprivation, inedible food, overcrowding, beatings, stress positions, and other human rights violations. 

Movement leaders, including Alice Paul, staged hunger strikes during their incarceration. When the media began covering the forced feedings and other violence at Occoquan, it helped sway public opinion in favor of the protestors’ cause, contributing to the passage of the 19th Amendment three years later.

Can’t make it to Washington D.C.? There are lots of digital collections you can explore from home, too. The National Women’s History Museum is an online institution that partners with libraries and other brick-and-mortar locations in the District while also offering virtual exhibitions on topics like Latina suffragists and Black feminist history in Washington DC.

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Boston, Massachusetts 

Boston was one of the historic centers of the American women’s suffrage movement, where movement leaders including Blanche Ames, Margaret Foley, Pauline Agassiz Shaw, Sojourner Truth, Lucy Stone, and Phillis Wheatley lived and worked. The Boston Women’s Heritage Trail encompasses many sites where you can learn more about their contributions. 

Head to Beacon Hill to see the former home of Women’s Era publisher Josephine St. Pierre Ruffin and her daughter Florida Ruffin Ridley, who organized the National Federation of Afro-American Women, a precursor to the National Association of Colored Women. Also in the neighborhood are the former homes of Little Women author Louisa May Alcott and Battle Hymn of the Republic composerJulia Ward Howe, as well as the first kindergarten in the United States.

The African Meeting House at 8 Smith Court is the oldest surviving Black church in the United States and played a key role not only in the suffrage movement but also in the abolitionist movement and the ongoing fight for Civil Rights. Also worth a visit are the Faneuil Hall Marketplace, the Massachusetts State House, the Margaret Fuller Neighborhood House, and the MIT campus.

In addition to self-guided itineraries, there are several women's history walking tours to choose from if you'd like a little more structure and context. Rest up afterwards at The Liberty Hotel, also in Beacon Hill. The name is ironic given the property’s history– this used to be the Charles Street Jail, where several National Woman’s Party members were incarcerated in 1919. You can enjoy a hotel history tour booked through the concierge, rent a bicycle to explore Boston the same way early feminists traveled.

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Denver, Colorado

Perhaps it’s surprising that so many destinations for women’s suffrage history are in the western United States, rather than in more established cities back east. But politics and propriety slowed the movement for many years, while the practicalities and challenges of life on the frontier invited different conversations about independence. Wyoming was the first state to legalize women’s right to vote, and Colorado was the second, a full 30 years before the passage of the 19th Amendment.

That history is front and center at the Center for Colorado Women’s Historyin Denver. Tucked next to the Clyfford Still Museum in Denver’s downtown museum district, the Center preserves the 1883 home of William Beyers, who founded the Rocky Mountain News. It is known as the Byers-Evans Mansion for its second owner, William Gray Evans, who lived here with his wife, two daughters, mother, and sister. The family furniture and decor throughout the home are used to tell the story of women’s role in both domestic and civic life over a century ago.

The Center currently features a Votes and Dreams exhibit that features an 1893 ballot that included the question of women’s suffrage, a letter from Susan B. Anthony to Colorado suffragette Ellis Meredith, historic clothing, and even local materials from the Denver Women’s Bank, which opened in after the 1974 passage of the Equal Credit Opportunity Act, which allowed women to open bank account and take out loans and credit cards without a male co-signer.

After visiting the Center, head to the Molly Brown House Museum less than a mile away on Pennsylvania Avenue. Molly Brown, in addition to surviving the sinking of the world’s most famous shipwreck, was an avid suffragette. She even ran for the U.S. Senate in 1914 on a votes-for-women ticket, leveraging her fame from the Titanic disaster. Her sumptuous Gold Rush-era mansion is included on the National Votes for Women Trail, as is 985 S Emerson Street further south. The latter was home to the Women’s League of Denver founder Elizabeth P. Ensley from 1915-1917, who was instrumental in mobilizing Black voters for women’s suffrage in Colorado and nationwide. 

Head to the 99ers Sports Baron East Colfax after your museum trips. Founded by female athletes, this is the only bar in Denver entirely dedicated to airing and cheering for women’s sports. The 99ers name references the legendary 1999 victory by the U.S. women’s soccer team against China, which paved the way for the first professional women’s soccer league. Denver is about to become an even bigger destination for women's soccer in 2028, when a brand new stadium is planned to open for a new National Women’s Soccer League team.

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Santa Fe, New Mexico

New Mexico, like Colorado and other early states to pass women’s suffrage legislation, at first limited women’s votes to things like school board elections that felt at least somewhat related to domestic life and raising children. Suffrage leaders in New Mexico like Nina Otero-Warren advocated for women to have a fuller voice in public life—and a bilingual voice, at that. Part of Otero-Warren’s success as one of the Land of Enchantment’s first female government officials and mobilizer of Hispanic women's votes stemmed from her fluency in both English and Spanish. 

You can visit the Otero-Bergere House in Santa Fe. The historic home is named for both Nina’s mother, Eloisa Luna Otero, and her stepfather, Alfred M. Bergere, who moved into this former housing for military officers in 1901. Otero-Warren lived here throughout much of her tenure as not only superintendent but also during her 1917 work with suffragette and Occoquan hunger strike leader Alice Paul as part of the Congressional Union for Women's Suffrage. In 1922, she became the first Latina to campaign for a seat in Congress. 

The Bataan Building in Santa Fe, a government office built in 1900 that was originally built as the Territorial Capitol and served as the State Capitol until 1966, features a memorial plaque commemorating Soledad Chávez Chacón, who was elected the first female Secretary of State in 1922. That same year, Isabel Eckles was elected State Superintendent of Public Instruction and ended her three-year tenure as acting president of what is now Western New Mexico University.

Less than half a mile away from the Bataan, the Palace of the Governors is where the Congressional Union was headquartered. The Santa Fe square in front of the Palace was a frequent setting for demonstrations and meetings as New Mexican suffragists worked first towards state enfranchisement and later toward ratifying the 19th Amendment.

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