Harriet Taylor Upton 1853 - 1945

Harriet Taylor Upton 1853 - 1945. . , From Ravenna to Warren To D.C.: 1853-1880s , Harriet Taylor was born December 17, 1853 in Ravenna, Ohio, the daughter of Ezra Taylor, an Ohio judge. The Taylors moved to Warren in 1861 and purchased the home known as the Harriet Taylor Upton House along Warren's "Millionaires' Row" on Mahoning Avenue in 1873. The Greek Revival home was built by General Simon Perkins in 1840 for his son, Henry B. Perkins. In 1880, Ezra Taylor was appointed to Congress, and Harriet accompanied him on trips to Washington, D.C. while Congress was in session. She became well known in society for her literary ability and amiable character, and married Attorney George Upton in 1884. In 1887, Ezra Taylor deeded the house to his daughter, which remained in her possession for nearly fifty years., Organizing For Equal Suffrage: 1890S - 1920 , By 1890, Upton emerged as one of the leading voices in the local, state, and national Women's Suffrage Movement, and would spend the next thirty years dedicating herself to the passage of the 19th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. In 1891, she hosted a gathering of women who sought out equal rights, known as the Ohio Women's Convention, within her Warren home. She served as a key organizer and first President of the Suffrage Association of Warren and served as President of the Ohio Woman Suffrage Association (OWSA) in 1899-1908 and again in 1911-20., Not for our sakes alone, then, but for the success of our cause throughout the land is it our duty to make Ohio next. Harriet Taylor Upton, 1912 letter., Upton became a member and later Treasurer (1894-1909) of the National American Woman Suffrage Association (NAWSA) when it formed out of a merger between the National Woman Suffrage Association and American Woman Suffrage Association in 1890, serving on the Congressional Committee with colleagues Carrie Chapman Catt and Susan B. Anthony. Between 1903-05, Upton brought the national headquarters of the NAWSA to her own home in Warren, Ohio, during which the National Conference was held in 1904. In 1905, the organization temporarily moved to the west wing of the Trumbull County Courthouse until 1909. Several months prior to the ratification of the 19th Amendment in 1920, the NAWSA dissolved and its members transitioned to a new organization, the League of Women Voters, for which Upton was a charter member., Representation For Women , Upton involved herself in numerous local, state, national, and even international organizations related to suffrage as well as temperance, education, and other political affairs. She was a member of the Daughters of the American Revolution and Woman's Christian Temperance Society. In 1898, she was the first woman elected to the Warren Board of Education. In 1920, she was elected Vice Chairman of the Executive Committee of the Republican National Committee, the first woman to serve on the highest national body of Republican politics. She stepped down from said position in 1924 to pursue a position in Congress, following in the footsteps of her father, but was unsuccessful in the primary election in Ohio's 19th District., Known not only as an activist and equal rights advocate, Upton was also notable in society as a great orator and writer. She was a prolific author of children's books and historical narratives, including but not limited to, A History of the Western Reserve (1910), A Twentieth Century History of Trumbull County (1909), and her memoir, Random Recollections (2014, written 1927).