Page:History of Woman Suffrage Volume 6.djvu/130

Il6 . HISTORY OF WOMAN SUFFRAGE Legislature and securing signatures to petitions. The second, at Orlando, Feb. 3, 1915, formed congressional districts, accord- ing to the plan of the National Association. The third, at Miami, March 15-16, 1916, arranged for suffrage schools and planned to assist work outside the State. The fourth, at Tampa, Nov. 20, 1917, found the members busy with war work. The fifth, at Daytona, Nov. 19, 1918, planned to introduce a bill for Primary suffrage in the Legislature and co-operate with the Federation of Women's Clubs to secure it. The sixth, at Tampa, Oct. 30-31, 1919, was devoted to plans for ratification of the Federal Suffrage Amendment and citizenship. While the State association could show no definite accomplish- ment, its work had been largely educational and a considerable public sentiment in favor of woman suffrage had been created. Its organization and growth center about the name of the Rev. Mary Augusta Safford, a pioneer worker in the suffrage cause in several States. She came in 1905 to make Florida her home from Des Moines, Iowa, where she had been pastor of the Unitarian church for eleven years. Her energy, enthusiasm and devotion carried all before her and but for her organization might have been delayed for years. For four years she was the untiring State president, then Mrs. Frank Stranahan served in 1917, Miss Safford again in 1918. The following, in addition to those elsewhere mentioned, are among those prominent in the suffrage work in the State : Mrs. A. E. McDavid, Miss Minnie Kehoe, Pensacola; Mrs. Susan B. Dyer, Winter Park; Mrs. H. W. Thompson, Miss C. H. Day, Milton; Mrs. S. V. Moore, Cocoanut Grove; Mrs. Kate C. Havens, Miami; Miss Pleas- aunce Baker, Zellwood; Mrs. Grace Hanchett, Orlando. From its beginning the association worked for the Federal Suffrage Amendment, although it tried also to obtain from the Legislature the submission of a State amendment to the voters. In 1915 Dr. Anna Howard Shaw, the national president, assisted Miss Safford and the other workers in holding conventions in several congressional districts. Many local meetings were held, much literature distributed, resolutions secured and legislators interviewed. The Federation of Women's Clubs, the largest organization of women in the State, endorsed the movement.