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1881 to 1890

1881

1882

1883

England

..... Sister Alice Ingham founded the Order of the Rochdale Rescue Sisters to provide support for Rochdale's orphans, poor, sick and dying, long before social services came into existence. She opened a baker's shop in the town's Yorkshire Street and used profits to fund the congregation's work. Eventually she moved to London where she officially established the order. Many members worked in Borneo as missionaries. She died in 1890

..... the first woman schools inspector was appointed by the Board of Education. Her name was Emily Jones

India

..... the doors to a degree in medicine were opened for women at Bombay University, so that for the first time in history, Indian women might learn to care for their own countrywoman. It had been made possible by the efforts of Dr Edith Pechey who had started to study medicine at Edinburgh with Dr Sophia Jex-Blake but had found the opposition to her sex unbearable and completed her training in Ireland and Switzerland and made her career in Bombay. She was an excellent doctor and an eloquent public speaker and also felt that her services were worth equally the same as those of her male colleagues. She tried to accustom Indian women to visit her in the hospital and as a result the Cama Hospital gained a high reputation and more distinguished women doctors began to go to the East to fulfil their ambitions

born July 20th

..... Catherine Bramwell Booth ..... her father was Bramwell Booth, son of William Booth, founder of the Salvation Army and she was born in London, one of seven children. They had no formal education and were taught by their mother with religion playing an important part in their lives. In 1903 she left home and went to training college. Her first job after training for the movement was in Bath as Captain. Her pay was 7s.6d per week and her job was to visit pubs and gin palaces selling the Army newspaper, War Cry. In the course of her work she travelled widely and in 1913 preached at a secret meeting in Tzarist Russia. After 48 years years continuous service she retired from full time Army work in 1948 but continued to preach at meetings. When she was 100 years old the BBC did an interview with her for television and she suddenly became known to millions of people even though for years she had been an ardent Salvationist and had helped many people through her work

born

..... Lofie Louise Preslar ..... in Louisiana. She married several times before 1910, drifted into prostitution and specialised in blackmailing from Texas to Boston. In 1915 she married Richard C Peete and in 1920 left him and went to work as a housekeeper-lover to Los Angeles millionaire Jacob Charles Denton. When he refused to marry him she murdered him and buried his body in the basement of his mansion. He was declared missing on May 30th 1920 but she went on living in his mansion, gave expensive parties and put through claims for his millions. By the time his body was discovered she had rented out the house and returned to Denver. Extradited from Colorado she was tried and convicted of his murder and was sent to prison for life and served eighteen years. In the meantime Richard Peete had killed himself. When she was released she was paroled into the care of the Logan's in Pacific Palisades, California and in 1944 Mrs Logan disappeared and her husband was put into an asylum by Louise.  When parole officers noticed something strange in the reports they were supposed to get from Mrs Logan they went to the house and found Mrs Logan's body buried in the garden with a bullet wound in the skull although Louise had said that it was Mr Logan who had killed his wife. She was again convicted of murder and this time was sent to Tehachapi and then to San Quentin where she was executed on April 11th 1947, the second woman in California history to go to the gas chamber

1884

1885

England

..... St Hilda's College, Cheltenham, England, the first women's teacher training college, was founded

Norway

.....  the Women's Suffrage Association was founded with Gina Krog as chairman

born

..... Adela Constantia Mary Pankhurst .....  youngest daughter of Emmeline  Pankhurst who worked with her mother for a short time in the WSPU (Women's Social and Political Union) but later emigrated to Australia, where she organised the Women's Party and the Australian Socialist Party. During the First World War she published Put up the Sword and during the Second World War was interred. She died in Australia on 23rd May 1961

born

..... Alice Paul .....  American feminist who was born in Mooretown, New Jersey into a Quaker family. She received her PhD from Pennsylvania University and published The Legal Position of Women. In 1907 she went to England to continue her studies at Birmingham and London Universities and became involved with the Pankhurst's Women's Social and Political Union. She was arrested six times and imprisoned three times after suffrage demonstrations in 1909. She went on hunger strike and was forcibly fed. In 1912 she returned to America and helped to organise the massive suffrage parades in New York. A year later she became head of the congressional committee of the National American Women's Suffrage Alliance but left to form her own more militant Congressional Union which became the Women's Party in 1916. After the franchise was won in 1918 Alice mobilised the Women's Party to fight for the Equal Rights amendment and campaigned vigorously through the 1920s. In 1923 she drafted the Equal Rights Amendment and kept the issue before Congress for nearly 20 years but died in 1977 without seeing it passed.  In 1928 she founded the World Party for Equal Rights for Women

1886

America

..... on July 4th America's "Everlasting First Lady", the Statue of Liberty was presented by the people of France to the people of the United States of America on the 100th anniversary of American Independence. She was made by Bartholdi, weighed c 225 tons, was c 150 ft in height and was placed on Bedloes Island in New York harbour where her 3½ ton beacon came to symbolise freedom for generations of immigrants who entered the harbour. In 1984 the 211 ft high torch, corroded by 98 years of wind and sea air was taken down in an emotional Fourth of July ceremony and was to be replaced by a new flame in time for the centennial celebrations in 1986

..... the Noble Order of the Knights of Labor established a Woman's Department to research women's work throughout the country

England

..... following the crusading efforts of Josephine Butler, the Contagious Diseases Act was repealed

..... the Guardianship of Infants Bill recognised the mother's role in child care

born 8th April

..... Elsie Cotton ..... in the Ordsall area of Salford, England. She became the idol of the theatre world, Salford's 'Merry Widow' and her face appeared on picture postcards, chocolate boxes and advertisements. Winston Churchill, as a young man, was once heard to say " It is unthinkable to see 'The Merry Widow' without Lily Elsie ( her stage name).  She was brought up by her grandparents on Trafford Road and began her show-business career as a child entertainer in local concert parties and at the age of nine was in demand for concerts at the London and North Western Hotel on Cross Lane opposite the military barracks. She was billed as 'Little Elsie' and part of her act was to do impersonations of favourite music hall artists such as Vesta Tilley and Harry Lauder. When Sam Higham wrote a sketch entitled "There'll Come A Time One Day, in which he and Elsie acted, it became very popular and the pair performed it across the road at the then new Regent Theatre (later the Palace) in a charity benefit for the manager. The sketch was repeated at the Prince Of Wales' theatre in Liverpool Street, and Elsie came to the attention of Richard Flanagan, manager of the old Queen's Theatre in Bridge Street, Manchester. In 1897 Flanagan engaged her to play the part of Princess Mirza in The Arabian Nights.'  Theatre managers competed for her services, she appeared at the Gaiety Theatre and afterwards went on tour but when in London she would only travel with her grandmother, Mrs Hodder. Her first musical was at the Strand Theatre in The Chinese Honeymoon. Back in Manchester, at the Queen's Theatre, she acted in ' See, See,' before receiving an invitation from George Edwards to accompany him to Vienna to see the musical by Franz Lehar, The Merry Widow. Edwards wanted Elsie to take the leading part in his London production but at first she declined the offer, as she felt unable to cope with the dancing, but eventually, and reluctantly, consented to appear. So, in 1907 The Merry Widow' came to London's Leicester Square. When 'Lily Elsie' appeared there were gasps of admiration and when she sang and dance the whole house was enchanted. The famous waltz was repeated over and over again. At the age of 26 years she married a millionaire's son, Ian Bullough, and the wedding took place at All Saints Church, Ennismore Gardens, London. in November 1911.  Elsie was given away by the Hon Charles Russell who had been the unsuccessful Liberal candidate for South Salford in the 1910 election. On the marriage certificate Elsie's mother, Elsie Cotton, was recorded as Elsie Barrett, a lodging-house keeper and her father, the late William Thomas Cotton, as being a former theatrical manager from Wortley, Leeds.  She retired from the stage and enjoyed a happy married life for many years but eventually her husband became an alcoholic and they went through a number of bad patches until they finally separated. The strain affected her also and she retired to a nursing home where she died on 16th December 1962

born

..... Hilda Doolittle .....  American poet known by her initials as H.D. was born in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, daughter of an astronomy professor. In 1904 she went to Bryn Mawr College but ill health forced her to leave two years later. At first she began to write children's stories but whilst on a visit to Europe in 1911 she came into contact with the Imagist group of poets and so began writing poetry herself. In 1913 she married the English author, Richard Adlington, and thereafter lived in England. They began to make translations from Greek which she continued in three collections in 1916, 1917 and 1919. She divorced her husband in 1937 and went to live in Switzerland. Her last collection Helen in Egypt was published in 1961, the year of her death. Besides her poetry she was also a novelist, wrote for Film Criticism and acted in films. Between 1927 and 1929 she contributed reviews to Close Up which was the first journal devoted to film as an art, the first to explore links between psychoanalysis and cinema and the first to translate S.M.Eisensteins' writings into English. She acted in two short films Wing Beat and Foothills and in 1930 collaborated on and acted in a longer film, Borderline

born April 3rd

..... Julia Chadwick neé Galt ..... who, when she died in 1991 at the age of 105, was classed as the oldest bridge player in Britain, if not the world. She was introduced to bridge when she joined the Dulwich Tennis Club and in the early 1930s was invited to play in the Gold Cup British Open teams championship. In 1936 her husband took a curacy in Wiltshire and she virtually gave up her bridge to help him until his death in 1950. Ten years later she met her friend and bridge partner Margaret Lancaster and together they were regular partners at various bridge congresses. In 1985 they won two cups - the mixed pairs at Harrogate and the Torquay Bridge Club pairs championships. They were also runners-up in the Devon Ladies teams at Torquay and Club championship teams. Mrs Chadwick was a life member of the English Bridge Union. She finally gave up attending bridge congresses just before her 103rd birthday but continued to play  several times a week

       1887                     

            1888                        

1889

1890