“Each time a girl opens a book and finds a womanless history,
she learns she is worthless.”
Myra Pollack Sadker
By P.A. Geddie
When County Line Magazine began serving rural Northeast Texas 26 years ago, part of its mission was to make sure women’s leadership contributions were highlighted. Historical accounts of women who helped form the region were difficult to find.
The Texas Historical Commission manages a program that displays historical markers around the state noting people who made a difference in the cultures and function of its existence. To date, of the more than 16,000 markers maintained by the state, only 4.2 percent are dedicated to women. Fifty percent of the population deserves better. Society deserves better.
Worse than the lack of markers, women are sorely missing from the history books. Children learn about what was deemed important by men, like war, laws, and politics, topics where women were relegated to the sidelines.
Without women at the table where decisions are being made, negotiations tend to focus narrowly on power positioning among men rather than broader societal needs, especially when it comes to the rights and laws concerning women, children, and other marginalized groups.
When the Europeans escaped the tyranny of the British Empire and created the United States of America, men including Thomas Jefferson, John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, Roger Sherman, and Robert Livingston prepared the Declaration of Independence to lay the framework for the country. John Adams’ wife, Abigail, wrote these words to her husband on March 31, 1776.
“I long to hear that you have declared an independency. And, by the way, in the new code of laws which I suppose it will be necessary for you to make, I desire you would remember the ladies and be more generous and favorable to them than your ancestors. Do not put such unlimited power into the hands of the husbands. Remember, all men would be tyrants if they could. If particular care and attention is not paid to the ladies, we are determined to foment a rebellion, and will not hold ourselves bound by any laws in which we have no voice or representation.”
Her words fell on deaf ears. The men who fought in the name of freedom continued to oppress women among other humans in the New World. They had no voice. They could not vote. They could not own property and had limited access to education, among many other human rights.
Abigail was right that the ladies would stir up a rebellion, but old habits die hard. It took almost 150 years of women fighting hard for their voices to be heard at the voting polls through lobbying, public speaking, marches, conventions, literature, and civil disobedience. Finally, the 19th Amendment gave women the right to vote and became law on August 26, 1920.
Since then, progress has come in the last 100 years, but it’s been slow and painful and not nearly enough. As more women joined the workforce outside homes, the pay gap between them and their male counterparts was enormous, and even today it’s still estimated that they make only 80 cents to the dollar to men doing the same jobs.
Statistics* today for violence and sexual assault against women show that one in five in the United States are raped in their lifetime (one in three are between the ages of 11 and 17) and 80 percent report experiencing some form of sexual harassment and/or assault in their lifetime. In addition, the National Institutes of Health estimates that one in four women are victims of domestic violence in the United States. Being shamed, bullied, and otherwise oppressed, these statistics are likely very low, as so many women still choose to stay silent for fear of retribution.
Some strides were made in the last 50 years in favor of women’s healthcare, legal rights, education, and leadership opportunities. Just one example: in 1974, the Equal Credit Opportunity Act was passed. Up until then, women had to have a husband or male relative’s permission to have credit cards, bank accounts, or buy a home in their own name. Much more work is needed to correct inequities against women.
Associate Professor of History at East Texas A&M, Mylynka Kilgore Cardona, PhD, says in a County Line interview a few years ago, that era was important in the fight for equal rights for women.
“That wave of feminism really opened all the doors for women in the subsequent generations,” Cardona says. “We had a little bit of a backlash in the 80s and early 90s, but we’re seeing with this generation now that [they] are really becoming more engaged and are really fighting for what we’ve been fighting for a long time.”
Cardona says today’s young women are making great strides.
“Millennial women [and] Gen Z women are way more involved in advocating for things for themselves. They’re building on things that women in the 20th century were fighting for,” Cardona says.
Better connectivity through the internet, voices speaking loudly regarding voting rights, movements like Me Too, and more men speaking up for women is making a difference.
“A lot of men don’t realize that almost every single woman they know has been sexually harassed, or they’ve been touched, assaulted, or raped,” she says. “I think [the Me Too Movement has] been eye-opening for a lot of men — not all men are assailants, not all men are abusive.”
In order to even the societal scales for everyone, more women are needed in powerful positions. Gender-balanced leadership improves decision making, increases stability, and ensures that diverse perspectives are considered in governance and business. The absence of women in power leads to distrust and an unbalanced system that oppresses rule by the people.
These positions are important so that women’s issues are met with the same attention as those of men. It is important to balance power so that all humans are seen and cared for, not just a few. It is women who naturally advocate for the wellness of children, families, and communities. No greater role is as important to society. They must have a seat at the table where decisions are being made.
“What women can do is to get involved and stay involved,” Cardona says, by voting, running for office, or volunteering at local organizations. For the first time in a long time our national government is (starting to reflect) what our nation looks like, and that can very much work for the benefit of everyone.”
We need women in leadership for their intelligence, perspectives, and caregiving nature. They make sure everyone gets a fair piece of the pie. While it is unfortunate that in their climb to break the glass ceiling, some women fall off into the tyrant pool of humans who think nothing of keeping the whole pie for themselves, thankfully, most women remain true to their nature.
Cardona says it’s important for women born into privilege “to stay engaged, stay active, and to do what we can to help uplift other women [and] advocate for those people who are losing their rights at every turn,” she says. “It’s about knowing what your privileges are and using them to your best advantage.”
Volunteering at the local level helps create opportunities for other women and can offer insight for change. Organizations such as Girls, Inc. and Girl Scouts support young women’s interests, while local food banks and shelters for battered women help women and families in need.
“Organizations that support other women are a great place to start,” Cardona says. “Getting involved in the community will make you more aware of what’s going on.”
Today, a record number of women make up 28 percent of the voting members of the United States Congress. The number of women-owned employer corporations is approximately 22 percent.
When those numbers rise closer to 50 percent, societal balance is imminent. Women are needed in our government, in our businesses, and in our communities, working side by side with men who oppose abuse, violence, and inappropriate control. Leadership from a collaborative, inclusive team makes the world a better place for all.
A Few East Texas Women
As much as state, national, and educational materials are lacking in stories of women, thankfully, the region is home to historians who dig deep to find information. Through letters and personal accounts, they put together the undertold stories of some women who contributed to the leadership of Upper East Side Texas.
A woman-owned publication, County Line Magazine articles often focused on the immeasurable contributions of women to history in Upper East Side Texas. Past and present, it is often women who keep good things happening in communities across this rural part of Texas. There’s a tenacity about them that speaks loudly to “lead, follow, or get out of the way.”
There are many women in leadership roles with city governments, chambers of commerce, tourism and economic development departments, nonprofits, and various other organizations that get good things done.
Likewise, the number of small businesses run by women, or in close collaboration with women, are numerous. While state numbers for women-owned or co-owned firms represent 45 percent of total small businesses, East Texas likely has a much higher percentage due to there being far more small shops. Either way, Texas women-owned small firms grew by 146 percent over the last 20 years, marking it as a top-three leader nationally.
There are thousands of women who make lives better for all in the region who have yet to tell their stories. Below we note a few of the women’s stories we were fortunate to include in the County Line pages.
Born February 19, 1815, in Norway, Elise Tvede Waerenskjold was an influential early promoter of Norwegian emigration to Texas. She didn’t quite fit the mold of the conventional woman. She was independent and the editor of a Norway newspaper in the early 1840s. By 1848 she was in Texas and helped establish a Norwegian settlement in Van Zandt County. Known as the “Lady With the Pen” for all the letters she wrote enticing Norwegians to Texas, she was a fierce leader who fought for women’s rights and the abolishment of slavery.
A wealthy and tenacious woman regarded as the grandmother of women’s suffrage in Tyler, Mary Louise McKeller Herndon became a leader of the cause in 1883 when she was 53, at the time a graduate of Baylor University, the wife of a former Congressman, and the mother of eight grown children. Elected to leadership positions with the Texas Equal Suffrage Association (TESA) and an alternate delegate to a National American Women Suffrage Association (NAWSA) convention, she lobbied for women’s rights, and worked as a community organizer and leader of the suffragette movement in East Texas. In 1913, Herndon organized the Smith County Equal Suffrage League to initiate another amendment push, and the Texas Legislature voted in 1918 to ratify what would become the 19th Amendment to the Constitution, making Texas the first Southern state to do so. Herndon died in 1919, having seen women vote in primaries, but not in general elections.
On May 7, 1861, Anna Pennybacker, clubwoman, woman suffrage advocate, author, and lecturer, was born in Petersburg, Virginia. Among her many contributions, she founded one of the first women’s clubs in Texas — the Tyler Women’s Club in 1894. She graduated from the first class of Sam Houston Normal School in Huntsville, Texas, and continued her education in Europe. Pennybacker wrote and published A New History of Texas in 1888, and the textbook was a staple of Texas classrooms for 40 years. She served as president of the Texas Federation of Women’s Clubs from 1901 to 1903, a position in which she raised $3,500 for women’s scholarships at the University of Texas and helped persuade the legislature to fund a women’s dormitory there. After holding important offices in the General Federation of Women’s Clubs, Pennybacker met Eleanor Roosevelt in 1924. Their 14-year friendship was based on mutual interests in the advancement of women and world peace. Pennybacker died in Austin in 1938.
Mary Kate Hunter (November 8, 1866 – April 15, 1945) was born just outside Palestine, Texas. She played a significant role in recording, promoting, and preserving the history of Palestine and Anderson County, she was educated at Palestine Female Academy and Sam Houston Normal Institute. She studied piano with classical musicians across the United States and in Germany, and taught piano to countless Palestine children. A supporter of voting rights for women, Hunter organized and was first president of the Palestine Equal Suffrage Association, and held statewide office in the Texas Equal Suffrage Association in 1915-16. In addition to her civic duties, Hunter also was a published poet, editor of a local society journal, and board member of the Texas State Library. At her death in 1945, she bequeathed her voluminous collection of material to the Palestine Public Library, where it remains in use as an important record of Anderson County history.
In 1897, Greenville’s Chautauqua Literary and Social Circle formed the Women’s Review Club, which aimed to create a circulating library; each member donated books. The Review Club opened its library in 1900. By 1903, the popular library had to move to larger facilities. It sought funds from philanthropist Andrew Carnegie, who offered $15,000 for a building. The local Federation of Women’s Clubs, under the leadership of May Moulton Harrison, provided the site, and the City formed a board of trustees for the public library, which opened in 1904. The library moved to new facilities in 1954 and again in 1996. Renamed for local historian W. Walworth Harrison, the son of May Harrison, the library continues to serve today.
Twenty-five Marshall women formed the Ingleside Circulating Book Club in 1887, each member buying a book and making exchanges. When that club and four others organized a federation in 1899, their first civic goal was a city library. Funds raised by the clubwomen provided 69 years of city library services without the use of public tax revenues.
A native of Panola County, Margie Elizabeth Neal (1875-1971) began her career as a teacher in 1893. She became editor and owner of the East Texas Register newspaper in 1904. A respected educator and leader in the woman suffrage movement, she was the first woman appointed to the State Normal School Board of Regents in 1921. Five years later, she made history as the first woman elected to the Texas Senate. After serving in several federal positions in Washington, she returned to Carthage in 1945 and was active in civic affairs for many years.
Lallie Prestley Dyer-Briscoe Carlisle was born in 1866 and quietly made history in Greenville in 1902 when she became the first woman in Texas to hold public office. Her husband, E.W. Briscoe, had died, and she was appointed to serve out his term as county clerk of Hunt County. It was 18 years before women won the right to vote, and 23 years before the Lone Star State elected its first female governor. She died in 1949 and is buried at East Mount Cemetery in Greenville. Women sometimes place “I Voted” stickers on Carlisle’s headstone to this day.
Five Tyler women’s clubs, the First Literary Club, Bachelor Maids, Quid Nunc, Sherwood Club and Athenian Club, collectively known as the Federated Women’s Clubs of Tyler, worked for several years to form a series of libraries for the town beginning in early 1900s.
Mame Roberts (Aug. 19, 1883-Dec. 24, 1976) lived her entire life in or near the community of Howe, 10 miles south of Sherman, Texas. Largely self-taught, she worked as a substitute teacher in the lower grades at the Howe Public Schools in the early 1900s before turning to her life’s work-promoting civic improvements and beautification. As the writer of a weekly column in the Howe Messenger, Roberts promoted her hometown and encouraged its beautification. Her campaign to make Howe the “prettiest little town in Texas” motivated other small Texas towns to take similar action. A series of articles in the Dallas Morning News provided step-by-step instructions for carrying out beautification efforts, and she was in great demand as a speaker at garden club gatherings throughout this part of the state. Roberts’ work attracted the attention of Life magazine and Reader’s Digest, and she was named “Woman of the Day” on May 14, 1949, on Eleanor and Anna Roosevelt’s national radio program. Her leadership positions included president of the Texoma Redbud Association, which urged the planting of redbuds along highways in Texas and Oklahoma.
The daughter of Texas Governor James Stephen Hogg, Ima Hogg was born in Mineola in 1882 and educated in both Texas and New York. A music lover from her days as a student, she became a lifelong patron of the arts and a philanthropic leader, eventually taking the role of the first woman president of the Philosophical Society of Texas. In 1967, she received a state award for her pursuits in historic preservation, an honorary doctorate in fine arts from Southwestern University in 1971, and UT’s Distinguished Alumnus Award, the first woman to do so.
In the early and mid-20th century, Nacogdoches was the home of a notable poet, writer, and woman of letters, Karle Wilson Baker. She first published in 1903 with a poem in Harper’s magazine. In the 1910s, she became the most frequently published poet in the Yale Review, and she gained a national reputation. In 1924, the Dallas News labeled Baker “The Poet of Quiet Things,” and Southern Methodist University awarded her an honorary doctorate of letters. Baker showed versatility, writing poems, essays, and novels. The State Textbook Commission adopted her children’s history reader, The Texas Flag Primer. Her 1931 collection of poems, Dreamers on Horseback, was nominated for the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry. Two of her successful historical novels, Family Style (1937) and Star of the Wilderness (1942), were set in East Texas. She taught at Stephen F. Austin State University in 1924 for 10 years, and the college houses the majority of her papers.
Born January 26, 1892, to sharecroppers in Atlanta, Cass County, Texas, Bessie Coleman went from working in cotton fields to playing a pioneering role in aviation history, becoming the first licensed pilot of African descent. Historians note that during that time frame, no one would teach a woman or an African-American to fly, so Coleman pursued her dream by studying French and sailing to France to earn her pilot’s license there. By the age of 29, she returned to the states and became a “barnstormer” or exhibition pilot, performing in air shows in Chicago and around the country. Reportedly, she refused to perform unless her audiences were desegregated and everyone used the same gates. She died at 34, doing what she loved, when her plane malfunctioned and she fell from the open cockpit.
Mita Holsapple Hall (1885-1965) organized the first Camp Fire Girls group in Sherman, Texas, in 1921. For the next 44 years, her commitment to the Camp Fire movement endeared her to the young women of Sherman and led to local, district, and national leadership positions and honors in the organization. In addition to numerous other civic and cultural activities, she co-authored a history of Grayson County for the Texas Centennial in 1936.
Lexie Dean Robertson was the first native-born Texas poet laureate, holding the title from 1939 to 1941. She was born in Lindale, Texas, on July 25, 1893. She grew up in Canton and married J. F. Robertson on August 16, 1911, while both were students at North Texas State Normal College (now the University of North Texas). Lexie taught school and was a high school principal in Eastland County, Texas, then earned a B.A. degree from Howard Payne College in 1925 and left teaching to devote herself to full-time writing. Her poems appeared in various newspapers, anthologies, and magazines, including Kaleidograph, Southwest Review, Holland’s Magazine, Country Gentleman, Good Housekeeping, and Ladies Home Journal.
Lillian Richard Williams was born March 23, 1891, in Hawkins, Texas, and grew up in the nearby community of Fouke. She worked in Dallas in 1910 as a cook, and in 1925 she was contracted by Quaker Oats Company to portray the Aunt Jemima character, demonstrating pancakes and other products. Her job “pitching pancakes” was based in small town Paris, Texas. Williams was with Quaker Oats for 23 years. She married James Diggs in 1935 and never had children. She suffered a stroke circa 1948 and moved back to Hawkins where her family cared for her until her passing in 1956. Her family noted “Our Aunt Jemima” on her gravestone. Her legacy continues in her hometown with the annual pancake festival in her honor. In 1995 the Texas legislature declared Hawkins the “pancake capital of Texas.” Williams is buried in Fauke Cemetery. At the Fauke community center, there is a historical marker about her life.
While most growing up with a bottle of Aunt Jemima syrup on their kitchen tables thought nothing more about the woman on the label than that she made delicious syrup, for others, it conjured racist minstrel stereotypes and a demeaning portrayal of Black women. In 2020, Quaker Oats removed the brand “to make progress toward racial equality.” Lillian’s family spoke out that year that while they supported the company’s decision and equality movements, Aunt Jemima represents a part of history for the family and the town of Hawkins they want to preserve.
Born near Atlanta, Georgia, in 1876, Mary Jim Morris moved to Greenville, Texas, in 1899 with her family. That summer, Mary received her teaching certificate from the Hunt County Normal School, locally known as the county teachers institute for colored teachers. Morris started teaching at a time when many African American students were just starting to attend school.
The birth of dance drill team performances happened first at a rural East Texas high school, then on a small college football field before gaining popularity around the world. The inventor of the art form was teacher and choreographer Gussie Nell Davis, who brought it to perfection. Born in Farmersville, Texas, on November 4, 1906, Davis went to public schools there and then to the Texas Woman’s University (formerly the College of Industrial Arts) in Denton with the intention of becoming a concert pianist. While there, her interest in dancing led to switching her studies to physical education. She graduated in 1927 with a Bachelor of Arts degree and began her professional career the following year at Greenville High School as a physical education instructor and pep squad sponsor. From there she moved to Kilgore and formed the Kilgore Rangerettes, who famously can kick so high they touch the brim of their hats with their legs. Gussie Nell famously told them after one performance to be sure to “wipe the lipstick off their legs.”
Running her one-woman McClendon News Service for decades and infuriating presidents from Franklin D. Roosevelt through the early days of the George W. Bush administration, Sarah McClendon was a mainstay of the White House Press Corps. She was mocked in the ranks of an almost all-male press corps in her early days, but eventually was honored as a pioneer. Born July 8, 1910, in Tyler, she worked in small Texas newspapers and served as a public relations lieutenant in the Women’s Corps in World War II. Moving to the Washington bureau of The Philadelphia Daily News in 1944 before starting her own news service two years later, she was a single working mother at a time when that was rare. Known for her long questions and lecturing the presidents, she became the longest-serving White House reporter, and in her later years, despite performing her duties from the constraints of a wheelchair, maintained a style so brash a colleague once described her as “giving rudeness a bad name.” McClendon wrote a memoir in 1996 entitled, Mr President, Mr President! My 50 Years of Covering the White House. President Bill Clinton’s press secretary, Michael D. McCurry, once mused that, “Many a president thought he could change the subject by calling on Sarah and lived to regret it.”
Hattie Brantley was born in Jefferson on April 4, 1916. She was a lieutenant and nurse in the U.S. Army at the start of America’s involvement in World War II and was stationed in the Philippine Islands when the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor. Taken hostage, she looked after prisoners at the University of Santo Tomas, including survivors of the Bataan Death March, until early 1945. When she retired in 1969 as a lieutenant colonel after nearly 30 years of service, she was the last Army prisoner-of-war nurse from World War II in uniform. Find her gravestone — noting her nickname “Angel of Bataan” — in Jefferson’s New Prospect Cemetery.
Just a week before she died on July 6, 1957, Lulu Belle Madison White was honored with the establishment of the Lulu White Freedom Fund by the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). She made significant contributions to help balance equal rights for American people of color during her lifetime. White was born in tiny Elmo, Texas, between Terrell and Wills Point on August 31, 1907. She was educated at the former Butler College in Tyler and became an early civil rights advocate and long-time leader of the NAACP, first in Houston (1939) and then statewide as president (1949). Best known for her role in challenging and ending Caucasian-only primaries, White also trained Black Americans how to vote, fought for integration of the University of Texas (1945), worked for equal pay for teachers regardless of race, and led many other efforts. The Houston NAACP chapter became the largest in the South under her leadership.
Born Claudia Alta Taylor in 1912 in East Texas’ Karnack near Caddo Lake, Lady Bird Johnson received her nickname as an infant, and it virtually replaced her real name. She was First Lady of the United States from 1963 to 1969 while her husband Lyndon B. Johnson was president. Lady Bird was a graduate of the University of Texas — studious and notably well-educated for a woman of her era. She was also known as a shrewd manager and investor, and after marrying Johnson in 1934, she bankrolled his congressional campaign with her modest inheritance and managed his legislative office during his stint in the navy. She also bought a radio station, followed by a TV station, which generated revenues that made them millionaires. As First Lady, she interacted directly with Congress, something that hadn’t been done before, even employing her own press secretary. Crediting her love of the outdoors with growing up shy and often alone in the piney woods, she was a fan of wildflowers and a lifelong advocate for city and highway beautification projects. She promoted the Highway Beautification Act, informally known as “Lady Bird’s Bill.” She also pushed her husband to support the Head Start Program to help low-income children in America, and before her death in 1963, received America’s two highest civilian honors: the Presidential Medal of Freedom and the Congressional Gold Medal.
Opal Lee, who got much of her inspiration and determination in her hometown of Marshall, Texas. She became the “Grandmother of Juneteenth” for her work in getting the important historical date made a federal holiday. And by the way, she did that in her 90s. Juneteenth, a name used for June 19, 1865, commemorates the day the enslaved people in Texas received word that the Emancipation Proclamation had actually freed them two and a half years earlier. Read details of her crusade, her time in Marshall, including graduating from Wiley College, and other articles in the archives that bring surprising full-circle moments.
One of the most familiar faces in East Texas belongs to award-winning journalist Joan Hallmark, who, on her “Proud of East Texas” segments on KLTV in Tyler, interviewed John Wayne, Clint Eastwood, George Foreman, Hank Aaron, Carol Burnett, both George Bushes, and many more. She retired in 2018 after 44 years. An East Texas native, she got her start at KTVT Channel 11 in Dallas hosting the “Joan Hallmark Show” at a time when very few women held on-air positions. From there she returned to East Texas, where she continued her work as a pioneer among women in the television industry. In her 2012 memoir, Sound Bites: Behind the Scenes with Presidents, Movie Stars, Great Athletes & War Heroes, she talks about her career and memories of the people she’s interviewed, including the many veterans featured on her “Freedom Fighter” segments.
At the time of a County Line interview in November 2008, Debbie Robinson was celebrating 25 years with Wood County Electric Cooperative (WCEC). She joined the company as an accountant in 1983, rose up through the ranks, and in 1996 became chief executive officer and general manager of the company that provides power to all or parts of nine counties in Upper East Side Texas. Just one of three women in Texas at that time in the traditionally male-oriented world of bringing electricity to homes and businesses, she managed a very successful operation with some touting it as “one of the best co-ops in the nation under her leadership.” Robinson went on to lead WCEC until her retirement in 2020 after 37 years of service.
Thousands of women were honored for outstanding leadership in the region in the last 26 years, and thousands more worked behind the scenes making the world a better place. County Line Magazine was able to note a few of them through the years who played significant roles in the economic development and quality of life for citizens of the region. Included are Lettie Clark, Wills Point; Pattizo Humphries; Edgewood; Lynn Kitchens, Grand Saline; Scarlett Sloan, Nacogdoches; Kristen Ishihara, Longview; Judith Guthrie, JoAnn Hampton, Barbara Bass, Dorothy Franks, Rosa Ferguson, Tyler; Tommie Ritter Smith, Carthage; and Jean Mollard, Palestine.
In March 2018, County Line Magazine featured a group of women playing a strong role in the renaissance of Greenville’s downtown and community nonprofit efforts to improve quality of life. Noted women were Janeen Cunningham, Dortha McGaughey, Barb Horan, Gail Sprinkle, Pat Guess, Luanne Dickens, Holly Gotcher, Abigail Kweller-Sullivan, Gloria Jordan, Theresa Sadler, Angela Melia, Carrie Crowson, Deana Lowe, Shannon Harris, and Lana Dollgener.
On the 100th anniversary of the 19th Amendment allowing women to vote, in July 2020 County Line reached out to women making a difference as business owners, elected officials, and civic leaders. Below are a few comments from those who gave their insights into this important anniversary and how the women’s suffrage movement impacted their lives a century later.
Pud Kearns of Greenville comes from a long line of strong women who made sure she knew about the battles fought by suffragettes and insisted that she never take voting for granted.
“My mother, Mary Horton Lauderdale, who would be 95 this year, regularly reminded me that women only got the right to vote five years before she was born. So that means that my grandmother, who was born in 1889, was 31 when the 19th Amendment was passed. I have a tangible link to that time — only three generations.”
Kearns says her grandmother, Gertrude Briscoe Horton, was an enormous influence on her life as an activist, volunteer, businesswoman and great storyteller. “She told me how she ran the family business while my grandfather served in World War II and how frustrating it was when he came home and wanted things to ‘go back to before.’ She knew they couldn’t’. So she threw herself into volunteer work (on a local and statewide level) and started a number of small businesses that she could run from her home that would look like “hobbies.” Her final business was an antique shop in her home, which she loved and ran until her death at age 88.”
Kearn’s great-grandmother, Lallie Briscoe Carlisle, was the first woman in Texas to hold elective public office as county clerk, a position she was appointed to in 1902 to fill her husband’s term after he died.
When Kearns became old enough to vote, her mother took her to the polls. “I remember the mild shock I felt when she gently directed me into my own booth to vote, saying that the ballot was my individual choice and right as an American.”
Yaziri Orrostieta, who is best known by her cool name fusion of YO, is a young female executive in Tyler who is benefitting from the battles fought by women before her.
Born in Los Angeles, Orrostieta was raised in a small town in Mexico until her family moved to Tyler when she was six. She attended the University of Texas at Tyler and obtained a master’s in international business from the University of North Texas in 2013. It was in her former role as vice president of marketing for Heritage Land Bank that she realized how the role of women changed dramatically since the 1950s.
“I had the pleasure of spending time with a longtime customer who once shared that she had been a customer since the late ‘50s because ours was the only bank that would give her a loan without a man cosigning on the note.
“She had lost her father at a very young age, went to college and was working as a teacher in the Houston area where she tried to purchase a home. Since she wasn’t married at the time, no bank would give her a loan without a husband or father to sign with her.”
It wasn’t until the 1970s that Congress passed laws allowing women to work while pregnant, to get a credit card in their own name, or to obtain a loan without a male co-signer.
For Orrostieta, a real estate entrepreneur who has purchased six real estate investment properties in the last five years, that privilege is not taken for granted. “I will never have to wonder if I’m able to purchase certain assets as an unmarried woman because of women like Mrs. Elizabeth and the suffragettes who fought to give women the right to have representation through their vote.
“The right to vote gave women the right to have a voice and be heard in many aspects of society. The fact that little girls do not have to limit their potential personally or professionally because of their gender is a celebration,” she says.
Mercy L. Rushing was born into a military family and traveled the globe before her father retired to his hometown of Mineola, Texas, when she was 16 years old. As an adult, she became a formidable leader for the town, serving as Main Street Director, and eventually City Manager.
“Women today have so much more opportunities and choices that were not possible 100 years ago,” she says.
Rushing believes the right to vote for women is one of the most important events of the century that helped change and shape the country for the better.
“It has provided women today to have a say in their own life, personally and professionally, while giving us protection and equality within our society. It gave women the ability to be more visible and gave us the confidence to be who we want to be and not what is expected for us to be.
“Gender should never hold us back in our dreams of what we want to accomplish or achieve,” she says. “We need to continue to empower young women and promote equality socially and economically through education so that we are treated on the same scale as men when competing for the same positions.”
Rushing is grateful for the women who worked to get the 19th Amendment passed a century ago. “[They] made it possible for me and other women today to be heard through our votes and be accounted for on our views and ideas on how we want to live our lives within our community and country.”
This is merely a sample of the many women noted in County Line for their leadership roles. Those who want to dig deeper will find thousands of references in the County Line archives.
Today, there’s a whole new generation of women making good things happen across Upper East Side Texas. Cheering them on goes a long way in shaping the region for a better quality of life for all. The more women’s stories are told in media, on historical markers, in history books, the more young women and girls see their own potential, build their confidence, achieve their dreams, and empower future generations.
LEARN MORE
The Texas Historical Commission says it is working to tell more “undertold” stories, including those of women. Find an interactive map and more information — including how to get more markers for women — on www.thc.texas.gov under Preservation Programs/Historical Markers.
The Ruthe Winegarten Foundation for Texas Women’s History formed in 2006 to carry on the work of its namesake. Dallas-born Ruthe Winegarten was a writer, historian, activist, and persistent advocate for the study of Texas women’s history. Winegarten’s friend, the late, ceiling-breaking governor of Texas, Ann Richards said, “Her commitment to having the stories of women’s lives be a part of our history was a driving passion in her life.” The two collaborated on numerous projects to elevate women in Texas.
The organization’s vision states, “that stories of unknown women are as important as those of the famous; that women are empowered by knowing their past; and that high-quality historical information should be available and accessible to large audiences.” www.womenintexashistory.org
Formed in recent years to help tell a more inclusive history of Texas, The Alliance for Texas History is another good resource at www.alliancefortexashistory.org.
OTHER RESOURCES
National Women’s History Alliance
www.nationalwomenshistoryalliance.org
National Women’s History Museum
www.womenshistory.org
National Collaborative of Women’s History
www.ncwhs.org
Portal to Texas History, www.texashistory.unt.edu
Pivotal, www.pivotal.com
He For She, www.heforshe.org
SOURCES
*National Sexual Violence Resource Center, www.nsvrc.org/statistics
United States Census Bureau, www.census.gov/programs-surveys/abs/data/nesd.html
