The Life and Work of Susan B. Anthony (Volume 2 of 2) / Including Public Addresses, Her Own Letters and Many From Her Contemporaries During Fifty Years

by Ida Husted Harper

Mrs. Cooper presided in her dignified and beautiful manner, and in her presentation said: "I have the very great honor and pleasure of introducing to this assembly one who has done more towards lifting up women than any other one person—Miss Susan B. Anthony." The Chronicle reported: "Then the audience made still further demonstrations. They clapped and cheered and waved, and some of the gray-haired women wiped their eyes because it is so seldom that people live to be appreciated. But Susan B. stood like a princess of the blood royal. Very erect of head and clear of voice she began her little speech. It was full of reminiscences, but some few people have the privilege of telling recollections without the fear of ever boring any one. Miss Anthony is one of these...."

Miss Shaw also received a hearty welcome; and all through that wonderful week the bright, appreciative, warm-hearted California audiences crowded the hall and listened and applauded and brought their offerings of flowers and fruit to lay at the feet of these two women, who had come from the far East to clasp their hands and unite with them in one great cause—the uplifting of womanhood. The Chronicle said:

Twelve hundred women went to Golden Gate Hall on Monday; fourteen hundred went Tuesday; two thousand Wednesday; twenty-five hundred Thursday. Golden Gate Hall could not hold one-fourth of the crowds, so all three of yesterday's sessions were held at the First Congregational church. Even there a stream of humanity blocked every aisle clear to the platform. Nobody ever supposed that the women of San Francisco cared for aught except their gowns, their teas and their babies. But they do. They like brains, even in their own sex. And they can applaud good speeches even if made by women, and they have all fallen madly, desperately in love with a very short, very plump little woman whose name is Anna Shaw. A year ago there were not more than a hundred women in San Francisco who could have been dragged to a suffrage meeting, but yesterday twenty-five times that number struggled and tore their clothing in their determination to hear Miss Anthony and Miss Shaw.

Again it commented: "There has been some talk that the Woman's Congress which expired last night attracted its crowds under false pretenses—that it promised to talk about the home and then preached suffrage. That is usually the case when Miss Anthony is about, but it was always suffrage in its relation to the home. Who, knowing Miss Anthony's reputation, could suppose that she would cross the continent in the evening of her life to discuss the draping of a lace curtain or the best colors for a parlor carpet?... Five thousand people waiting on the steps of the Temple Emanu-El for the purpose of hearing the woman preacher's last address does not look as if her position were uncertain. Mere curiosity does not take the same people to nineteen consecutive sessions."

"Apotheosis of Woman," the Examiner headed its fine reports; and the Call, the Bulletin, the Post, the Report, and the newspapers around the bay all gave columns of space to this great meeting which had discovered to the State of California its own remarkable women.

Miss Anthony had been the guest of her old friend, Mrs. A. A. Sargent, whose hospitality she had enjoyed so many years in Washington City. As the suffrage amendment was to come up the next year, Miss Anthony and Miss Shaw met with a large number of ladies at the Congregational church and helped them organize a campaign committee, with Mrs. Cooper as its chairman. In accepting the office she said: "I intend to put all there is of me into current coin and use it to forward this Heaven-ordained work. If ever a woman was thoroughly converted to this idea I have been, and in this spirit I accept the charge."

In the afternoon of this same day Mrs. Cooper escorted them to the Y. M. C. A. Hall to address the Congregational ministers at their regular Monday meeting, to which they had been officially invited. That evening they were the guests of honor at the Unitarian Club dinner at the Palace Hotel, Miss Anthony responding to the toast, "The Rights and Privileges of Man;" Miss Shaw to "The Manly Man;" Rev. A. C. Hirst and Dr. Horatio Stebbins to "The Rights and Privileges of Woman" and "The Womanly Woman;" and the evening was a lively one. They addressed the girls' high school, and accepted also an invitation to speak to the 900 teachers at the institute in session at Golden Gate Hall. They were the guests of the Century Club, Sorosis and other San Francisco societies of women.

A friend, Mrs. Mary Grafton Campbell, wrote from Palo Alto that she heard President Jordan say every remaining day and evening of the semester were filled, and when she exclaimed, "But Miss Anthony is coming; what about her?" he replied, "There will be room for Miss Anthony if we have to give up classes." Immediately he wrote her a cordial invitation to visit the university, offering to pay her travelling expenses and expressing a wish to entertain her in his home. She accepted for herself and Miss Shaw, and they spoke to as many students as could crowd into the chapel. Mrs. Stanford sent a personal invitation for them to attend the reception which she was to give the first graduating class in her San Francisco residence.[112] They were invited to the beautiful Water Carnival at Santa Cruz, and to the Flower Festival at Santa Barbara. It would be impossible, indeed, to mention all the delightful invitations of both a public and private nature, and there was not a day that did not bring a remembrance in the shape of flowers and the delicious fruit in which Miss Anthony revelled.