Vernon County censor. [volume] (Viroqua, Wis.) 1865-1955, 1901-03-13
WOMEN AND THEIR ADVANCEMENT.
Miss Lucy Dawson's Interesting and Humorous
Account Of Fifty Years Of Progress.

If the grandmothers of fifty years ago
could see the new woman of today
they would, doubtless, be both surprised
and disgusted. True, the times have
changed; but most of all the women have
changed. The women of that day were
rather inclined to look with scorn upon
the idea of an education and more than
one We're sincerely OF the opinion of the
outspoken old dame who said, Il want
my gals to learn spinology, sew osogy,
knitology and cookology Them's the
ologies woman needs. = Possibly it was
as well that the large me - of the
woman were content with leir lot for
educational advantages not easily
ATTAINED by the girls of Il !. generation.
Massachusetts now is Of 4 tally proud
of her cultured daughts but when it
was proposed in the ca q days OF this
century to open the : ic schools OF
Hatfield in that state I & iris one of the
directors sprang exc s iy to his feet
and shouted, SWh 2 she in Hatfield
schoolsY No. never C
In those good : times scientists
measured heads an arefully weighed
brains and demonstrated conclusively
that woman was incapable of receiv-
ing college education. 1t Is amusing
to US now to think of eminent clergy
me preaching most eloquent sermons
to prove that the education of woman
was unscriptural As late as 1S47 when
Lucy Stone Blackwell graduated from
Oberlin-the first educational college
she was not allowed to read her COM
mencement essay because 1t was not
proper for woman to read in public,
Fifty years later the ideas of the college
t,an, ant an nhan0ad that Gha
was invited to deliver the address at
the semi-centennial of her all a mater.
Today two-thirds of the colleges of our
country and every state university west
of Ohio admit women on an equal foot
ing with men. Even those ancient down
east" universities that have been keep
ing the girls in ''annexes" have begun
to ponder deeply that old and always
puzzling question, Does the dog wag the
tail, or the tail wag the dogY Women
now have full suffrage in four states.
school suffrage in twenty-four states,
municipal suffrage in one and in two
other states tax-paying women are pea
mitted TO vote upon every question sub
mitted to tax payers. Political POSITIONS
of every description are now held by
women and as Josiah Aliens wife
quantity puts ii, They sit upon school.
library, hospital and all sorts o planks,
the most of EN- hard ones.
However, the new woman has not been
content with obtaining equal education
al advantages and far more than an
equal share of college honors--in spite
of her weighed and measured brain. she
has scorned the stays, the backboards
and the trailing skirts OF the past gem
Grafton al has donned common sense
shoes, rainy day skirt, laundered
shirt waist and collar and coat and hat
closely modele after her brothers. In
deed. she has not feared to wear bloom
ersp or even 'knickerbockers" and ride
down the avenues astride. For one
brief season she wore shingled hair and,
| doubtless, secretly lamented that she
| had no use for razor. Possibly she has
been little too ''mannish;" Int was IL
not natural that the pendulum should
have its swing after being helG in one
position 30 long? Let her have her
Swing" and when she has settled down
little she may allow the boys few OF
the college honors and the privilege OF
wearing their own clothes. The woman
of the last days of the 10Th century and
these early days of the goth century
has been slightly intoxicated BIZ the
wonderful successes of the past so years.
She has conquered worlds and she sees
before her worlds that must yet be
conquered. Before the close of this cen
tury she may have conquered them all
and have succeeded in fulfilling that
sneeringly made, though possible proph-
ecy that before the close Of the 20th
century woman would occupy the
presidential chair" In the meantime,
woman will go right on ruling men and
nations, as she has always done and, II
she find it strictly necessary, she will
not hesitate to take up the weapon of
the Aborigines and go forth to enforce
the man made laws as has the brave, II
erratic, Mrs. Carrie Nation of Kansas.