The record of the admission of women to this ancient university is part of the history of the Woman Suffrage Association, because all the initial movements were taken by that body, the so society which continued the work was separated from the association only for purposes of practical efficiency, and the first principle on which the movement proceeded was that of absolute equality in educational opportunity, which is the corollary of political democracy. With its actual opening to women, however, other elements of leadership assumed control and have secured later results.
On Jan. 16, 1892, the original association having practically secured its object, the money in the treasury was turned over to the Women's Educational and Industrial Union, and from that body finally found its way to a scholarship fund for the Women's College, and the association disbanded. Later the need for raising funds to meet the requirement for buildings and endowments led to the reorganization of the work, and the present Rhode Island Society for the Collegiate Education of Women. was formed. Miss Doyle was elected the president of this new association, as she had been of the old. At the dedication of Pembroke Hall, which the efforts of this later society had secured, the early history (especially the connection of the Woman Suffrage Association with the work) was not dwelt upon, but the facts should have permanent record to furnish one more proof that woman suffrage societies have started great collateral movements, which, when they are fully successful, often forget or do not know the "mother that bore them."[1]
It was not until 1893 that the full classical course of the Providence High School, preparatory for the university, was officially thrown open to girls, although a few had previously attended.
- ↑ The Suffrage Association has held one meeting in Pembroke Hall, however, which was presided over by its acting president and at which the daughter of Julia Ward Howe, Mrs. Florence Howe Hall, spoke upon "The Political Position of Women in England;" and the use of Sayles Hall of Brown University was freely granted for a series of meetings under the auspices of the W. S. A. devoted to a presentation of "Woman's Contribution to the Progress of the World." These were addressed by Abba Goold Woolson, Mary A. Livermore, Lillie Devereux Blake, Lillie Chace Wyman, Alice Stone Blackwell, Mary F. Eastman, Prof. Katherine Hanscom and the Rev. Anna Garlin Spencer. In October, 1901, Miss Susan B. Anthony addressed the students and was enthusiastically received.
