Canada, Women, and the Vote
Topic: Women in Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta were the first to achieve the vote in Canada in 1926. What were the three most important factors in achieving this success?
Selected Primary Sources
Nellie McClung, In Time Like These
Agnes Simmons to Sir John. A. MacDonald, Letter - Thank you, Feb 14, 1885
National Council of Women of Canada Fonds (NCWC) is an advocacy organization aimed at improving conditions for women, families, and communities. It is the Canadian member of the INternational Council of Women (ICW). It has historically concerned it self with women's suffrage, immigration, health care, education, mass media, the environment, and other issues. The fonds consist of meeting minutes, letterbook correspondence and registers, newpaper clippings, and other subject files containing resolutions, reports, printed material and clippings. Also included are official documents, financial records, reference material, publications and committee files.
International Council of Women Fonds, 1893-
Manitoba: Digital Sources on Manitoba History, "Women Win the Vote" fonds. Click on the tabs to view photos, newspapers, and links to other useful sources
Notman Photographic Archives. Provides a visual history of Montreal, Quebec, and Canada from the 1840s to the present. An iconographical data bank of 1,300,000 photographs of landscapes, well known people, families, places, and events.
Canadiana Discovery Portal. This site enables users to search across the valuable and diverse digital collections of Canada's libraries, museums, and archives.
Collections Canada. Keyword search for "suffrage" yields links to related fonds and individual items of correspondence
McCord Museum - Editorial Cartoons. These cartoons range in date and topic and provides a glimpse into early-late 20th century politics and issues
McCord Musem_ - Online Collections. A keyword search for "suffrage" yields photos, a wood engraving of the WCTU Temperance pledge, and a register from a WCTU sheltering home with notes on all of the women.
Alberta Provincial Women's Christian Temperance Union. The collection ranges from the early 1900s to the 1970s, providing a wide range of meeting minutes, photographs, annual reports, and other scanned historical documents.
Nellie McClung, In Time Like These
Agnes Simmons to Sir John. A. MacDonald, Letter - Thank you, Feb 14, 1885
National Council of Women of Canada Fonds (NCWC) is an advocacy organization aimed at improving conditions for women, families, and communities. It is the Canadian member of the INternational Council of Women (ICW). It has historically concerned it self with women's suffrage, immigration, health care, education, mass media, the environment, and other issues. The fonds consist of meeting minutes, letterbook correspondence and registers, newpaper clippings, and other subject files containing resolutions, reports, printed material and clippings. Also included are official documents, financial records, reference material, publications and committee files.
International Council of Women Fonds, 1893-
Manitoba: Digital Sources on Manitoba History, "Women Win the Vote" fonds. Click on the tabs to view photos, newspapers, and links to other useful sources
Notman Photographic Archives. Provides a visual history of Montreal, Quebec, and Canada from the 1840s to the present. An iconographical data bank of 1,300,000 photographs of landscapes, well known people, families, places, and events.
Canadiana Discovery Portal. This site enables users to search across the valuable and diverse digital collections of Canada's libraries, museums, and archives.
Collections Canada. Keyword search for "suffrage" yields links to related fonds and individual items of correspondence
McCord Museum - Editorial Cartoons. These cartoons range in date and topic and provides a glimpse into early-late 20th century politics and issues
McCord Musem_ - Online Collections. A keyword search for "suffrage" yields photos, a wood engraving of the WCTU Temperance pledge, and a register from a WCTU sheltering home with notes on all of the women.
Alberta Provincial Women's Christian Temperance Union. The collection ranges from the early 1900s to the 1970s, providing a wide range of meeting minutes, photographs, annual reports, and other scanned historical documents.
Selected Secondary Sources - Online
Florence Bird et al., Report of the Royal Commission on the Status of Women in Canada (Ottawa: Supply and Services, 1970)- Of most value are chapters 3 (Women and Education) and 7 (Participation of Women in Public Life) which contain names, statistics and information pertaining to late nineteenth and early twentieth century Canadian women
From The Manitoba Historical Society: Information on Lillian Beynon Thomas, Dr Mary Crawford, Harry and Mildred Gutkin "Give us our Due!", the Political Equality League of Manitoba
Women Suffrage and Beyond. E. Cora Hind was world renowned as an outstanding journalist, lecturer and writer and was a foremost authority on all aspects of agriculture.She was the first typist and stenographer in western Canada, and the first western woman to succeed in journalism. She initiated the western farm reports, pioneered the preparation of crop reports, was the early secretary of the Manitoba Dairy Association, and was the first woman to navigate a boatload of wheat out of Manitoba's Port Churchill. Cora was also active in the Winnipeg Women's Christian Temperance Union and petitioned with Nellie McClung for the franchise of women.
Adelaide Hunter Hoodless has been called one of the most famous Canadian women yet one of the most obscure because she is known with such familiarity in some circles, yet completely unknown in others. From humble beginnings, Adelaide was born on February 27, 1857 and raised on this isolated farm in what was once known as Canada West. Her legacy is far-reaching. She is credited as a co-founder of the Women’s Institute, the Young Women’s Christian Association (YWCA), the National Council of Women and the Victorian Order of Nurses (VON). She was also a powerful force behind the formation of three faculties of Household Science. She achieved national recognition in her twenty years of public life. She died in 1910, one day short of her 53rd birthday.
Veronica Strong-Boag, “Ever a Crusader: Nellie McClung, First Wave Feminist”, in Rethinking Canada: The Promise of Women’s History, 3rd edition, edited by V. Strong-Boag and Anita Claire Fellman (Toronto: Oxford University Press, 1997)
Selected Secondary Sources - Print available at Rockridge Library
Women, Changing Canada (305.4 COO)
The Proper Sphere: Women's Place in Canadian Society (305.4 PRO)
Women's Rights (305.42 THO)
Canadian Women: A History (305.40971 CAN)
Canadian Women and the Struggle for Equality (305.4 MAR)
Her Story: Women from Canada's Past (305.4092 MER) - 3 volumes
Unfolding Power: Documents in 20th Century Canadian Women's History (305.42 STA)
Emily Murphy (971.061 JAM)
Nellie McClung (305.52 GRA)
A Nation is Born: World War I and Independence (971.062 NEL)
Nellie McClung (305.42 PEZ)
Women's Rights: Changing Attitudes 1900-2000 (305.42 STE)
Women on the Move: Struggles for Equal Rights in England (324 TRE)
Women, Changing Canada (305.4 COO)
The Proper Sphere: Women's Place in Canadian Society (305.4 PRO)
Women's Rights (305.42 THO)
Canadian Women: A History (305.40971 CAN)
Canadian Women and the Struggle for Equality (305.4 MAR)
Her Story: Women from Canada's Past (305.4092 MER) - 3 volumes
Unfolding Power: Documents in 20th Century Canadian Women's History (305.42 STA)
Emily Murphy (971.061 JAM)
Nellie McClung (305.52 GRA)
A Nation is Born: World War I and Independence (971.062 NEL)
Nellie McClung (305.42 PEZ)
Women's Rights: Changing Attitudes 1900-2000 (305.42 STE)
Women on the Move: Struggles for Equal Rights in England (324 TRE)
