Clarina IH Nichols

Clarina Irene Howard Nichols

Clarina Irene Howard Nichols , born Clarina Irene Howard (born January 25, 1810 in West Townshend , Vermont , † January 11, 1885 in Potter Valley , California ), was an American journalist and suffragette .

Life

Education and first marriage

Clarina Irene Howard was born in Townshend, Vermont, the daughter of Chapin Howard and Birsha Smith, the eldest of eight children. Her father was a well-known businessman, landowner, and local politician. He was also an active member of the Baptist Church. She attended the local public schools and in 1828 a private school.

Clarina Howard married Justin Carpenter in 1830. Carpenter was a graduate of Union College, Guilford. This marriage was unhappy. The couple moved to Brockport , New York , where they ran a school, the Brockport Academy , and published a newspaper, with little success . Then the Carpenters moved to Lower Manhattan . Carpenter studied law , but through his extravagance they lost their dowry and Carpenter's irascibility led Clarina Howard Carpenter to leave him and return to Townshend with their three children in 1839.

Women's rights

After returning to Townshend and separating from her husband, she worked as a journalist for the Windham County Democrat in Brattleboro . She divorced Carpenter in February 1843 and married the editor of the paper George Washington Nichols in March 1843. In 1844 a son was born. At first she wrote anonymously and became increasingly involved in the interests of women. These initially included household affairs and the right to have a say in school matters, later with the pseudonym Deborah Van Winkle , a Yankee matron, she became increasingly involved at the political level. Under their influence, the paper continued to develop literarily and was more oriented towards a large number of reform proposals.

She supported the anti-slavery movement, and from 1847 onwards she dealt with a series of columns on the rights of married women and the lack of economic security of married women. After this had already been an issue in New York, the Vermont legislature took up the issue and changed the marriage laws so that married women had limited control over their real estate. Even in later years, Nichols placed great emphasis on protecting widows from poverty.

At the second national convention on women's rights in Worcester , October 1851 , Nichols gave a distinguished speech. The rights and stories of mothers and widows in need became their trademark in advocating women's rights . She became the first woman to speak to the Vermont General Assembly in October 1852 on the topic of women's participation in school matters. There she had little success, however.

Her demand for more rights for married women, with her emphasis on economic provision, did not fully correspond to the demands for equality in the women's movement , nevertheless Nichols became an advocate of the women's movement and a friendship developed with Susan B. Anthony , of Nichols in devoted a chapter to her book History of Woman Suffrage Volume IV (1883–1900).

Kansas

Convinced that she had better opportunities for her demands in the more open-minded West than in the conservative Vermont, she moved with two sons to a farm in Douglas County , Kansas, in accordance with the Kansas-Nebraska Act in 1854 . Their endeavor was to intervene in the dispute over slavery and to fight against slavery. The Kansas-Nebraska Act gave the region's white population a free choice of how the new states would position themselves on the issue of slavery. Since her husband became seriously ill in Vermont, she returned and stayed with him until his death. After the death of her husband, she went back to Kansas and moved to Wyandotte County . There she became a writer in the spring of 1857 for Quindaro Chindowan , a newspaper that was directed against slavery. She toured the territory and gave speeches for the rights of married women.

Because of her experiences in Kansas to abolish slavery, she now campaigned for the movement of abolitionism in addition to the demands for women's rights . She became a supporter of the Free Soil Party and in 1856 was one of the first women in the East to campaign for the Republican Party . At the Wyandotte Constitutional Convention in 1859, she stood up as one of the founding mothers of the state of Kansas for women's rights. As the official representative of the Moneka Woman's Rights Association , she assured married women constitutional guarantees for their property, the safeguarding of their rights and equal rights in school matters and the right of women to participate in the meetings of the school boards.

As a result of the Civil War , her political activities, as well as her work for the women's rights movement, were restricted. She moved to Washington, DC, to live with her daughter for financial reasons and worked in the Quartermaster General's office. In Washington she helped freed slaves and became Superior of the National Homes for Destitute Colored Women and Children in Georgetown until 1866. After that she returned to Kansas, where she continued with Susan B in an unsuccessful campaign for complete equality for women Anthony fought in 1867.

Late life and death

In 1871, she moved to Potter Valley, California, with her youngest son and daughter-in-law of Wyandot . After the death of her daughter-in-law in 1873, she helped raise three children - her grandchildren. In California, she continued to publish columns in the Pacific Rural Press of San Francisco on women's rights until her death in 1885. Two years after her death, Kansas women were given the right to vote at the community level, and in 1912, to amend the Kansas Constitution and give women equality in all elections.

Clarina Irene Howard Nichols died on January 11, 1885 in Potter Valley, California. Her grave is in Potter Valley Cemetery.

Web links

• Clarina IH Nichols in the database of Find a Grave (English)
• Carina IH Nichols on Online Archival Search Information System
• The Forgotten Feminist of Kansas: The Papers of Clarina IH Nichols, 1854-1885, edited by Joseph G. Gambone, Spring 1973. In: kancoll.org. Retrieved June 19, 2016 . 

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b c d e f g} American National Biography Online: Nichols, Clarina Howard. In: Anb.org. Retrieved June 18, 2016 . 
2. ↑ ^{a b} Karen: Clarina Nichols. (No longer available online.) In: gracehudsonmuseum.org. Archived from the original on June 18, 2016 ; Retrieved June 19, 2016 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.  
3. ^ ^{A b c} Territorial Kansas Online - Biographical Sketch - Clarina IH Nichols. In: territorialkansasonline.org. Retrieved June 19, 2016 . 
4. ↑ ^{a b c d e} Clarina Irene Howard Nichols. In: robinsonlibrary.com. Retrieved June 19, 2016 .