Oral history interview with Adele Clark, February 28, 1964
Subtitle: interview G-0014-2, Southern Oral History Program Collection (#4007)
Contributors: Broadfoot, Winston, interviewer; Southern Oral History Program; University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Documenting the American South (Project); University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Library
Edition: Electronic ed.
Publisher: University Library, UNC-Chapel Hill
Published: 2007
Place of publication: [Chapel Hill, N.C.]
Language: eng
Subjects: Interviews; Suffragists; Women; Suffrage; Women's rights; Equal Suffrage League (U.S.); Equal Suffrage League of Virginia; League of Women Voters of Virginia
Other titles: Interview G-0014-2, Southern Oral History Program Collection (#4007); Interview with Adele Clark, February 28, 1964; Oral histories of the American South.
Description: Born and raised in the South, Adele Clark was a founding member of the Equal Suffrage League of Virginia and the League of Women Voters in Virginia. Clark first became involved in the suffrage movement in 1909, when she became the secretary of the Equal Suffrage League following its formation. Because of her position in the organization, Clark went to the National American Suffrage Association convention in Washington, D.C., in 1910 as an alternate delegate. When one of the official delegates fell ill, she became an active participant in the convention. Clark describes the proceedings, including President Howard Taft's speech to the delegation. Clark explains how the Equal Suffrage League worked to amend the state constitution during the 1910s but then shifted their focus to the state ratification effort after Congress adopted the 19th Amendment. According to Clark, immediate ratification in Virginia failed in part because of lingering bitterness regarding Reconstruction as well as opposition to the more militant factions of the feminist movement. Despite obstacles posed by the Virginia General Assembly, Virginia women were able to establish a League of Women Voters in 1920. Clark describes the subsequent voter registration efforts--including obstacles for African American women--and attempts by the League of Women Voters to become actively involved in state politics by way of the formation of the Children's Code Commission. Throughout the interview, Clark discusses leaders in the suffrage movement, including Carrie Chapman Catt and Lila Mead Valentine, and she offers her thoughts on the support, or lack thereof, of state politicians such as Harry Byrd and George Walter Mapp. She concludes by describing how women in the movement had to contend with slurs against their personal character from their opposition.
Notes: Title from menu page (viewed on October 29, 2007).

Interview participants: Adele Clark, interviewee; Winston Broadfoot, interviewer.

Duration: 01:47:00.

This electronic edition is part of the UNC-CH digital library, Documenting the American South.  It is a part of the collection Oral histories of the American South.

Text encoded by Jennifer Joyner.  Sound recordings digitized by Aaron Smithers.

Text (HTML and XML/TEI source file) and audio (MP3); 2 files: ca. 129 kilobytes, 195 megabytes.

Original version: Southern Oral History Program Collection, (#4007), Series G, Southern women, interview G-0014-2, Manuscripts Department, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Original transcript: 43 p.

Funding from the Institute of Museum and Library Services supported the electronic publication of this interview.

Mode of access: World Wide Web.

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