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Frances G. Hunsicker, b. 1876

Mrs. Frances G. Hunsicker served as head of the two most important women’s organizations in the city of Akron, Ohio, in the 1920s: the Home and School League and the Federation of Women’s Clubs.

Hunsicker served first as assistant secretary treasurer of the Akron and Summit County Federation of Women’s Clubs and was later elected president of the organization in 1926. For several years she was instrumental in the Federation’s annual Christmas Seal campaign. Hunsicker was elected as president of the Federation again in 1928 for a second term.

During the year of her re-election, Hunsicker served as the TB clinic chair of the General Federation and a story in the Akron Beacon Journal said that she “spent many weary hours when the building [TB Clinic] was in the process of renovation in consultation with lawyers, decorators, carpenters, plumbers and insurance men.” The newspaper also described her as a “clear-thinking and active citizen.”

After being treasurer in 1917, Hunsicker held the position of president of the Akron Home and School League for several terms, including the 1921-1923 term. In 1922, the president of the Central Home and School League asked other leagues to help in a project to assure that crippled children would have a means of transportation to the hospital. In 1926, the president of the General Federation said, “It seems to be Mrs. Hunsicker’s policy to do what she can in one life and then step quietly out and take up the next thing that offers itself.”

Hunsicker was also secretary of the Liederfel Ladies Society and a commissioner of the Girl Scouts Akron Council. In 1927, she was president of the Girl Scouts and in 1936, she was a board member for the organization.

Hunsicker was a member of the Fifty Year Club and the First Universalist Church. She was president of the Dandelions Club and active in the Fairlawn Civics Club.

She was married to Arthur Hunsicker, a builder and contractor; they had six children. The Hunsickers resided at 726 Sherman St.

Photo courtesy of the Beacon Journal.

–Janelle Baltputnis

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Blanche Eugenie Bruot Hower, 1862 – 1952

Blanche Hower, social feminist and vocational education advocate, helped to further the equality of women in Ohio.

Born in Valentigney, France, Hower came to the United States with her family when she was very young. She attended a one-room school in Akron and married Milton Otis Hower, director and vice president of the American Cereal Company, in 1880.

During her life, Hower was exposed to successful self-made men, namely her father and her husband. She understood the importance of education and it was her duty-first, pleasure-second attitude that enabled her to assume the presidency of the Akron-Selle Company after her husband’s death in 1916.

An avid traveler, Hower brought treasures from all over the world home to Hower House, a beautiful Victorian mansion now operated as a museum by The University of Akron.

Hower’s community memberships included the Portage Country Club, Akron Art Institute, where she served as a trustee, and the Summit County Federation of Women’s Clubs. She served as vice president of the Fifty Year Club of Akron and was honorary president of the Italian Cultural Club.

In answer to the need for vocational training for young people, Hower donated space downtown for the city’s first trade school. The school was named in honor of her husband.

Although she preferred not to march in demonstrations, Hower did have a lifetime membership in the Ohio Woman Suffrage Association. The first time women were allowed to vote, Hower made sure that she and all the women who worked in her household went to the polls.

One of the most remarkable traits about Hower was her determination to effect positive social change. She began her political career at age 67, when she ran for Akron Board of Education. Hower won by a landslide because she stood firmly on educational issues, and because she was the only candidate to campaign over the radio.

Just when she was about to end her political career, Hower was nominated for Ohio State Representative and won the seat in 1935. She was the only Republican woman elected that term. Because she was so well received and respected by her fellow legislators, Hower was named “Mother of the 91st General Assembly,” and was presented with a flag for her service.

In tribute to her longtime local and state involvement, a quote from the Beacon Journal on October 21, 1953, says she was “one of the finest citizens in Ohio and the nation…and representative of the kind of women who should get into politics and politics would be better for it.”

Photo and campaign ad courtesy of The University of Akron Archives.

–Penny Fox

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Mary A. Holmes, d. 1986

Mary Holmes and Akron’s Civil Rights movement grew up together. In 1918, she was one of the founders of the NAACP in the city. In the 1920s, she was a staffer for the African-American newspaper. In 1940, she made her way to president of the Council of Negro Women. By the 1960s, she was with the Summit County Community Action Council as a “housing adviser.”

She never planned on that life. “I never planned to get knocks on my head, but somebody’s got to get the knocks to get things done,” she told the Beacon Journal in 1975. “My biggest pleasure is doing something for somebody.”

Born in Buchanan, Va., Holmes attended high school in Charleston, W.Va. She moved to Akron in 1918. Conditions for African Americans in the city were bad. Everything seemed to be segregated. It was little wonder that Holmes would help found the city’s NAACP chapter as soon as she moved to town.

For a time, Holmes worked as a stenographer/bookkeeper for a small manufacturing company. In 1921, she, along with William B. Johnson and William Byrd, started theBlack and White Chronicle, a weekly newspaper covering the city’s African-American community. Holmes was bookkeeper/proofreader/reporter for the newspaper. Opie Evans remembered that Mary Holmes was vital to the newspaper’s life. “You know, that Mary Holmes was everything in that office. She really kept that paper going” (Beacon Journal, Feb. 11, 1991).

After the newspaper folded in 1927, Holmes held a variety of jobs from catering to domestic work and continued to be a leader in the African-American community. She was the secretary of the Colored Women’s Republican Club and president of the Council of Negro Women. She also served as the secretary of the Woman’s Auxiliary of the NAACP. In 1962 to 1964, when racial tensions were highest in Akron, Holmes was president of the city’s NAACP.

Holmes worked with the Summit County Community Action Council “for about as long as anyone can remember,” the Beacon Journal reported. In 1975, she was a “housing adviser,” helping set up the Emergency House for families displaced by eviction or forced out of their homes by disasters, and worked at the North Akron Neighborhood Center.

In 1975, she announced that she was retiring. When she looked back over her long career in Akron, she could see progress. As far as segregation was concerned, Akron was a better place to live. In 1978, the churches in the community acknowledged her role in the city by giving her the “Brotherhood Action Award.”

Holmes died in Akron on April 9, 1986.

 

Photo courtesy of the Beacon Journal.

. –Kathleen L. Endres

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Hermine Zipperlen Hansen, 1859-1942

Mrs. Hermine Zipperlen Hansen, described by her friends “as a tireless worker for Akron’s cultural and welfare development,” in the Akron Beacon Journal, left her $60,000 estate to various clubs and institutions in Akron.

When Hansen died on Jan. 8, 1942, most of her estate was left to the Edwin Shaw sanitorium and to a trust fund designed to assist “worthy but needy students” at The University of Akron. The rest of it was divided up among other Akron area organizations with which she was affiliated.

Hansen was the daughter of Civil War surgeon Adolph Zipperlen and was the widow of Hans Hansen. She was the sister of Mary Schumacher, second wife of Ferdinand Schumacher, the so-called “cereal king” of Akron.

During her life, Hansen was the chairperson of committees for the Woman’s City Club. In 1917, she served as president of the Woman’s Council, a citywide federation of women’s clubs from across the city. She remained active in the Woman’s Council, even after it was renamed the Akron and Summit County Federation of Women’s Clubs. One of the most important fund-raising efforts of the Federation was the sale of Christmas Seals, the revenues of which were used in the city for various health efforts. She handled the Federation sales in both 1923 and 1924. She was also given the responsibility of chairing the committee that organized the Ohio Federation of Women’s Clubs convention in Akron. She was an early president of the College Club of Akron as well.

Earlier in her life, Hansen taught school in Cincinnati.

She and her husband resided at 41 North Portage Path in Akron.

Photo courtesy of the Beacon Journal.

–Janelle Baltputnis

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Catherine Garrett, died 1962

Mrs. Catherine W. Garrett was one of the early female members of the Akron Board of Education.

The first woman had been elected to the Akron Board of Education in 1896, but after that Akron public schools had gone 20 years without a woman on its school board. In 1918, Mrs. A. Ross Read was elected and four years later in 1922, Garrett joined her on the board. In 1925, both women resigned in protest when the four-man majority, said to be dominated by the Ku Klux Klan, engineered the hiring of a new superintendent in a secret session.

Garrett was heavily involved in local educational organizations even before her election. She was one of the founders of the Findley School Parent Teacher Association and a lifetime member as well. She also served as president of the Akron Council PTA.

In addition to her interest in education, Garrett also participated in other city activities. She was one of the founders of the Fifty Year Club and she served as a trustee for that organization. She was a member of the Monday Study Club, the Women’s Universalist Missionary Association, the Akron and Summit County Federation of Women’s Clubs, the Alumni Association of the Akron and Summit County Federation of Women’s Clubs and she was a chairman of committees for the Woman’s City Club.

In 1917, Garrett held the position of recording secretary of the Akron Home and School League and she served as president of that organization from 1919-1921. In 1931, she was the Universalist Women’s Club representative to the Akron and Summit County Federation of Women’s Clubs. She also attended the First Universalist Church in Akron.

Garrett, who was born in Liverpool, England, came to live in Akron when she was 1 year old. She married Charles W. Garrett, who was a broker. She was widowed in 1948. When she died in 1962, she left behind two daughters, Margaret and Jean. The Garretts resided at 3533 Bath Road.

Garrett died in Akron in 1962 after a short illness.

Photo courtesy of The University of Akron Archives.

–Janelle Baltputnis

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Celia Esselburn Frank, 1864-1930

When Celia Esselburn Frank died in 1930, the Beacon Journal called her a “pioneer Akron social worker.” That seemed an apt description. What made her different was how she worked. She had no affiliation with any charitable organization or agency in the city. She just did her relief work on her own.

Celia Esselburn was born near Lodi. Her father was Lewis Esselburn, a Medina County merchant. Before she married, Esselburn was a telephone operator staffing Akron’s first exchange. She was married to J.C. Frank, an Akron attorney.

Once she married Frank, she started helping the needy of the city. Her home became a kind of clearing house for used clothing for the needy.

According to the Beacon Journal, Frank worked under the direction of the Probate Court. She distributed used clothes to those in want. In reporting her death, theBeacon Journal said, “Social work was her great aim in life through her efforts, happiness was left where squalor and want was found.”

Frank was a member of First Church of Christ Scientist.

–Kathleen L. Endres

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Mary Peavy Eagle, 1909-2003

Mary Peavy Eagle, founder of the Akron Council of Negro Women in 1932, had a singular mission in her life, to improve the conditions African Americans faced in Akron, Ohio.

Eagle credited a walk on Glenwood Avenue with opening her eyes. A teacher had taken her children out to recess and it seemed to Eagle that the two or three little African-American children “looked a little less cared for than the others. So then I thought – I see this, so now I’ll have to do something about it.”

Eagle got together a group of women and started a club. “I wanted the mothers to take more pride in their children. We encouraged the parents to join the PTA; visit the schools; meet the teachers, and get to know each other. This would make it easier for the children to do well in school. We also worked with the schools in educational programs. We were successful at that. If there was any way that could help a mother by finding clothing for her children we did. We secured clothing, more food, and what not. We helped any child.” One of her biggest concerns was getting an African-American teacher at Bryan school. Eventually African-American teacher Herbert Bracken was appointed to that school over the protests of some white parents (Oral Black History Project, 1990, The University of Akron Archives).

It was that activism that led Mary Eagle to be the first African-American woman president of a PTA in Summit County.

Eagle, then Mary Peavy, came to Akron in 1924 from Checotah, Okla. Her father came to work in the rubber factories and found a job with Miller Rubber. The Peavys were a big family. Mary was the eldest of seven. Several of her sisters, particularly Anne and Sarah, were also leaders in the African-American women’s community in Akron. Mary Peavy attended old North High School.

By 1927, barely out of her teens, Mary Peavy was superviser of the Young Ladies Progressive Club. Sisters Sarah and Anne were also officers. The club provided services to the poor. They distributed groceries and money to needy families. Other officers included Cora Armstrong, Addie Mae Williams, Ruth Coffee, Ada Driskill and Velma Varner.

In 1929 Mary Peavy married Isaac Thomas Eagle, a Goodyear rubber worker who was also from Checotah, Okla.

In 1932, when most African Americans were struggling during the Depression, Eagle started the Council of Negro Women to coordinate efforts among the neighborhood clubs. In 1936, African-American leader Mary McLeod Bethune copied Eagle’s model and created the National Council of Negro Women.

Eagle did not stop with the Council of Negro Women. She continued her activism throughout her life. In the late 1930s, Eagle heard about a slum clearance program, one of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s WPA projects. Eagle contacted her councilman, Ray Thomas, and asked for help. He agreed and the slums on North Street were replaced by the brick homes of Elizabeth Park Homes.

Eagle was always a Democrat. She remained active in Democratic politics throughout her life. She sipped tea with first lady Bess Truman and was invited to President John F. Kennedy’s inauguration. She was also a delegate to the 1954 UNESCO conference in Washington, D.C.

Eagle, a lifetime member of the Mt. Zion Baptist Church, had two daughters, one a teacher in the Akron Public Schools and the other a public relations executive in Houston.

Eagle is buried at Glendale Cemetery.

 

Photo courtesy of The University of Akron Archives.

–Kathleen L. Endres

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Ruth Ebright Finley, 1884-1955

Ruth Ebright Finley, “girl reporter, sob sister, feature writer” for the Akron Beacon Journal in the early 20th century, went on to a career as an editor, a biographer, an expert on American quilts – and one of the greatest clairvoyants of the 20th century.

It’s a long trip from Akron to the afterlife but was an easy one for Finley because she lived two quite separate lives.

Ruth Ebright was born in Akron, the daughter Dr. L.S. Ebright and his wife, the former Julia Ann Bissell. Her father himself lived a kind of dual existence, one as a physician and one, for a time, as the postmaster of Akron.

Ebright was well educated for her day. She enrolled in Oberlin in 1902 but returned to Akron the next year to go to old Buchtel College (now The University of Akron). She never completed her degree.

Instead she started her reporting career with the Beacon Journal. This was a time of sob sisters and sensational journalism. Ebright won a name for herself when managed to get an interview with the former Akronite wife of inventor Thomas Alva Edison. She then went on to the oldCleveland Press. She was best known for her stories on the working conditions of labor women and she is credited with helping get a bill passed that was designed to benefit working women. It was while at the Cleveland Press that she met and married Emmet Finley, an editor there.

Finley had a varied journalistic career after that. She was woman’s page editor of the Cleveland Press, fiction editor of the Scripps-Howard newspaper chain, managing editor for the old Washington Herald, woman’s editor of the Enterprise Newspaper Association, assistant editor ofMcClure’s magazine and editor of Guide Magazine and theWoman’s National Political Review.

There were many dimensions to Finley’s life. Building on her interest in quilts and quilting, she wrote the book, Old Patchwork Quilts and the Women Who Made Them. Part of the movement to reawaken American interest in quilts and quilting, Finley designed the quilt given first lady Eleanor Roosevelt. There was a certain irony in this because Finley was a critic of the New Deal, Franklin Delano Roosevelt and the first lady on the pages of the Woman’s National Political Review, the periodical she edited.

Finley was also an historian of sorts. In 1931, she published a biography of antebellum magazine editor Sarah Josepha Hale. The Lady of Godey’s: Sarah Josepha Haleis still considered an important resource on Hale and her popular woman’s periodical.

Even as Finley continued her career as an editor, quilt expert and historian, she and her husband were exploring different aspects of reality.

As Joan and Darby, the Finleys became chronicling their exploits in the afterlife in their 1920 book Our Unseen Guest. That book chronicled how they first got involved in the paranormal. In Cleveland in 1916, they played with a Ouija board and met their guide to the afterlife, a volunteer ambulance driver who had died in France the year before. Although Our Unseen Guest quickly became a classic in psychic literature, the Finleys were able to keep their involvement in the paranormal secret.

Ruth Ebright Finley died in 1955. Her husband had died five years earlier. The couple did not have any children. Ruth Ebright Finley’s papers are located in The University of Akron Archives.

Photo courtesy of The University of Akron Archives.

–Kathleen L. Endres

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Carrie Peterson Dick, 1859-1943

Carrie Peterson Dick was a woman more comfortable in the background but her involvement in Akron’s arts and welfare communities belied that tendency.

In history books when Carrie Peterson Dick is mentioned at all, she is identified with her husband, Congressman and “president maker” Charles Dick of Akron. But when her husband was off studying law or fighting in the Spanish-American War or serving in both houses of Congress or making a president (McKinley), Dick had her own life building and strengthening many of the cultural and welfare institutions and organizations in the city of Akron.

A charter member of the Fifty Year Club, Dick also helped start the Art and History Club. She was also one of the founding members of the Akron Art Institute and the first woman member of its board. Because of her position in the community, she was also invited to serve on the boards of the Sumner Home for the Aged and the Young Women’s Christian Association (YWCA). Both Dicks were members of Trinity Lutheran Church.

That type of community involvement seemed inconsistent with the Beacon Journal’s characterization of Dick as a “quiet little woman, she has preferred to remain in the background.”

Carrie Peterson married her high school sweetheart in 1881. They had met at Central High School. The couple had five children. The Dicks are buried in Glendale Cemetery.

 

Photo Courtesy of the Beacon Journal.

–Kathleen L. Endres

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Maud Hayes DeVaughn, 1848-1943

Maud Hayes DeVaughn was a leader in the fight for prohibition in Akron, Ohio, and played active roles in many other organizations during her 75 years.

DeVaughn’s 16 years as officer of the Summit County Women’s Christian Temperance Union (WCTU) displayed her strong beliefs in prohibition. She served as secretary for nine years, and she retired 1933 after seven years as president.

After her term with the WCTU was complete, DeVaughn moved over to leadership roles at the Akron and Summit County Federation of Women’s Clubs. She served as president of that organization in 1936.

DeVaughn was also the founder and president of the South High PTA.

DeVaughn began a radio series in 1936 that focused on Akron women and public welfare. She was a member of the Board of Maintenance of the YWCA and the Board of Goodwill Industries.

A member of First United Brethren Church, DeVaughn died in 1943.

Photo courtesy of The University of Akron Archives.

–Jennifer Petric