vassar's alternative activism

when DeeDee passed around the UCSD student-made book on suppressed campus activism, it made me remember the rumors and stories i’ve heard about Vassar’s history of activism, especially during the suffrage movement. the coolest story i’ve heard about the suffragettes on campus is that in 1908 they met in the cemetery off campus because the president, James Taylor (a conservative Baptist) refused to let them organize on campus. however, if you go to the encyclopedia, it just says that the students organized there as a demonstration against Taylor’s politics but not that they were barred from campus. i guess the encyclopedia is pretty reliable, but either way, i love the story as a testament to the commotion they managed to rouse (and still do)...according to the article their meeting even made New York newspapers.


that’s Vassar alum Inez Milholland (class of 1909), the often-photographed woman on the horse who lead the famous suffrage march outside the white house in 1913 the day before Woodrow Wilson was inaugurated.

- abra