Susan Brownell Anthony
Susan Brownell Anthony
People Buried Here
People Listed
Epitaph
CHILDREN OF DANIEL & LUCY READ ANTHONY, Susan B. Anthony, EQUALITY
Description
Mary Stafford Anthony was born on April 2, 1827, to Daniel and Lucy Read Anthony, in Battenville (Washington County), New York. Her father was a liberal Quaker (Society of Friends) abolitionist, and although her mother had been raised a Baptist, the Anthony family were raised as Quakers. Anthony had three sisters and two brothers. One of her older sisters was Susan B. Anthony.
Anthony’s father was at various times a shopkeeper, the owner and manager of cotton mills, a farmer, and an insurance agent. While the family lived in Battenville, her father, then a thriving mill owner, established a school in his house for his children and many of those in the neighborhood. It was there that Anthony received much of her early education.
During the Panic of 1837, Daniel Anthony lost everything, and he and his family were almost forced to give up all they owned to auction. Their most personal belongings were saved only when Anthony’s uncle, Joshua Read, bid for them and returned them to the family.
In 1839, the Anthonys moved to Hardscrabble (later called Center Falls), New York. When Anthony was seventeen years old she followed the footsteps of her older sister Susan and became a teacher. She taught at a district school in Fort Edward, "boarded ’round" with district families and received $1.50 per week for her labors.
In 1862, Anthony’s father died. The family farm was eventually sold, and Anthony moved with her mother to Rochester, living first on North Street and finally settling at 17 Madison Street. In 1870, Lucy Read Anthony became an invalid, and for the last six years of her life until her death in 1880, she was entirely helpless. Anthony assumed primary responsibility for her care.
In addition to her teaching and caregiving roles, Anthony also proved willing to come to the aid of her older sister Susan. In 1870, when Susan’s journal The Revolution was in financial straits, Anthony not only loaned her sister money to help save the journal; she also spent a sweltering New York City summer working in the journal’s office, while Susan traveled to raise money and attract subscribers.
Susan often expressed appreciation that her younger sister generally assumed the responsibility of caring for ill and dependent family members, thereby allowing Susan to devote her energies to women’s rights activities. The Anthony sisters’ respect and appreciation was mutual, however, and their relationship symbiotic. As a teacher, Anthony applauded her older sister’s work on behalf of women’s rights. In 1870, she sent Susan a gift of $50, saying that the sum was "not a present, merely, but...a debt...for ‘services rendered.’" She noted that "Had there been no agitation for the last twenty years...we teachers might still be working for $1 per week and 'boarding ‘round’...."
Although Anthony was to remain in the shadow of her famous older sister, she was a suffrage activist in her own right. Her interest in women’s rights, in fact, preceded that of her sister. On August 2, 1848, she attended the Adjourned Convention in Rochester of the First Woman’s Rights Convention and, together with her father and mother, signed the Declaration of Sentiments. In November of 1872, she was one of the women who, along with her sister Susan, voted in the presidential election. Anthony again attempted to register to vote in 1873, this time unsuccessfully. In 1878, she acted as a Monroe County delegate when the National Woman Suffrage Association (NWSA) held its convention in Rochester, New York, to celebrate the thirtieth anniversary of the first woman’s rights convention., Susan B. Anthony was born February 15, 1820 in Adams, Massachusetts. She was brought up in a Quaker family with long activist traditions. Early in her life she developed a sense of justice and moral zeal.
After teaching for fifteen years, she became active in temperance. Because she was a woman, she was not allowed to speak at temperance rallies. This experience, and her acquaintance with Elizabeth Cady Stanton, led her to join the women's rights movement in 1852. Soon after, she dedicated her life to woman suffrage.
Ignoring opposition and abuse, Anthony traveled, lectured, and canvassed across the nation for the vote. She also campaigned for the abolition of slavery, the right for women to own their own property and retain their earnings, and she advocated for women's labor organizations. In 1900, Anthony persuaded the University of Rochester to admit women.
Anthony, who never married, was aggressive and compassionate by nature. She had a keen mind and a great ability to inspire. She remained active until her death on March 13, 1906.
, words EQUALITY & Liberty written at top of stone.
4 photos total for this family, HUMANITY, WIFE OF AARON M McLEAN
Ask an expert about your family tree
Additional data from member contributors
Relationships
Life Story
Susan B. Anthony (February 15, 1820 – March 13, 1906) was an American social reformer and women's rights activist who played a pivotal role in the women's suffrage movement. Born into a Quaker family committed to social equality, she collected anti-slavery petitions at the age of 17. In 1856, she became the New York state agent for the American Anti-Slavery Society.
In 1851, she met Elizabeth Cady Stanton, who became her lifelong friend and co-worker in social reform activities, primarily in the field of women's rights. In 1852, they founded the New York Women's State Temperance Society after Anthony was prevented from speaking at a temperance conference because she was female. In 1863, they founded the Women's Loyal National League, which conducted the largest petition drive in United States history up to that time, collecting nearly 400,000 signatures in support of the abolition of slavery. In 1866, they initiated the American Equal Rights Association, which campaigned for equal rights for both women and African Americans. In 1868, they began publishing a women's rights newspaper called The Revolution. In 1869, they founded the National Woman Suffrage Association as part of a split in the women's movement. In 1890, the split was formally healed when their organization merged with the rival American Woman Suffrage Association to form the National American Woman Suffrage Association, with Anthony as its key force. In 1876, Anthony and Stanton began working with Matilda Joslyn Gage on what eventually grew into the six-volume History of Woman Suffrage. The interests of Anthony and Stanton diverged somewhat in later years, but the two remained close friends.
In 1872, Anthony was arrested for voting in her hometown of Rochester, New York, and convicted in a widely publicized trial. Although she refused to pay the fine, the authorities declined to take further action. In 1878, Anthony and Stanton arranged for Congress to be presented with an amendment giving women the right to vote. Introduced by Sen. Aaron A. Sargent (R-CA), it later became known colloquially as the Susan B. Anthony Amendment. It was ratified as the Nineteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution in 1920.
Anthony traveled extensively in support of women's suffrage, giving as many as 75 to 100 speeches per year and working on many state campaigns. She worked internationally for women's rights, playing a key role in creating the International Council of Women, which is still active. She also helped to bring about the World's Congress of Representative Women at the World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago in 1893.
When she first began campaigning for women's rights, Anthony was harshly ridiculed and accused of trying to destroy the institution of marriage. Public perception of her changed radically during her lifetime, however. Her 80th birthday was celebrated in the White House at the invitation of President William McKinley. She became the first female citizen to be depicted on U.S. coinage when her portrait appeared on the 1979 dollar coin.