first fruit

“I never forget that we are sowing winter wheat which the coming spring will see sprout and other hands than ours will reap and enjoy.” – Elizabeth Cady Stanton (as quoted on a plaque in a park dedicated to her in downtown Seneca Falls, New York)

I admit that Elizabeth Cady Stanton probably would have aggravated and annoyed me if I lived when she did, but I respect her courage and conviction. In 1866 she (unsuccessfully) ran for the U. S. House of Representatives. A newspaper one hundred years ago this month pictured Jeannette Rankin, the first United States Congresswoman. From The New-York Times (image 5), August 19, 1917:

firsts

Woman was a major theme of that issue of the Times, including Russian female soldiers and a courageous Frenchwoman – a schoolmistress who acted as mayor during the German occupation and who hid wounded French soldiers and helped them escape.

And so much more.

Merci

honors from Russia

I’m not saying the the winter wheat quote was only about women eventually getting elected to Congress. Looking for more information about the Lincoln monument in Chicago, I was surprised that a bust of Lincoln was reportedly defaced earlier this month. One of the things that concerns me about removing Confederate monuments is that I don’t think everything is black and white.