I was going through the RELIC collection to choose books for the display honoring Women's History Month and came across the book "The Campaign for Woman Suffrage in Virginia" by Brent Tarter, Marianne E. Julienne, and Barbara C. Batson. The book traces the history of Virginia's women's suffrage from the early 20th century in 1910 to when the United States ratified the Nineteenth Amendment in 1920 to 1952, when Virginia ratified the state constitution. I recommend this book because it talks about the women's suffragist movement on a state level and its leaders, who are rarely ever heard of but were significant in the fight for equal voting rights on a state and national level.

Some of the prominent leaders of the women's suffrage movement in Virginia included well-known authors Ellen Glasgow and Mary Johnston, artists Adele Clark and Nora Houston, and one of the most significant contributors to the cause, Lila Hardaway Meade Valentine, who actively supported the cause till her death in 1921, and is the only woman to have a memorial inside the Virginia state capitol. Due to segregation practices at the time, black civic and business leaders supported the women's suffrage movement within their communities, such as successful businesswoman Maggie Lena Walker and well-known civic leader Ora Brown Stokes.

To learn more about the history of women's suffrage in Virginia, check out "The Campaign for Woman Suffrage in Virginia" by Brent Tarter, Marianne E. Julienne, and Barbara C. Batson, call number 323.623 Tar. You can also see our display at Central Library spotlighting women's organizations in Virginia during Women's History Month.