Clara ColbyJohn HollidayHolliday (Mission to China) chronicles the life of little-known Midwestern suffragist Clara Bewick Colby in this scholarly but eminently readable biography. Born in England, fiercely smart and ambitious Clara Bewick came to the U.S. as a child. After studying law, civics and literature, she graduated as valedictorian of her class at the University of Wisconsin in 1869 and hastily married Civil War veteran Leonard Wright Colby. The pair moved to Beatrice, Neb., where Clara founded the town’s first library and later became a suffrage activist alongside such historical luminaries as Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton.
Holliday’s painstaking research brings Clara to life from dry, dusty history pages, piecing together her story and its context from letters, newspapers accounts, and her personal papers. He respectfully yet comprehensively chronicles Clara’s personal challenges—including raising two adopted children, Zintka, an infant survivor of the Battle of Wounded Knee, and Clarence, an intellectually disabled 11-year-old, as well as learning that her husband fathered at least one illegitimate child—and painstakingly celebrates her triumphs, as well as the victories of a nascent movement for women’s rights. Clara was the first woman in the United States to receive a war correspondent’s pass (as founder and editor of the Woman’s Tribune), and participated in the 20th-century precursor to the modern-day Women’s March, held in London in 1911. Sadly, Clara died four years before women finally gained the right to vote, and emotionally invested readers will feel a pang at the knowledge that she never saw her movement’s success.
While Clara Bewick Colby isn’t as well known as Anthony and Cady Stanton, Holliday’s biography may well change that. Impeccably and lovingly researched and punctuated with firsthand sources and historical photos, this work is ideal for anyone wanting to take a deep dive into the women’s suffrage movement.
Takeaway: Historians and feminists alike will relish this robust biography of a little known suffragist who played a major role in helping women get the power to vote.
Great for fans of Ida Husted Harper’s The Life and Work of Susan B. Anthony, Carrie Chapman Catt and Nettie Rogers Shuler’s The Inner Story of the Suffrage Movement.
Production grades
Cover: A
Design and typography: A
Illustrations: A
Editing: A
Marketing copy: B+