Lucy Stone Equal Civil Rights Rebel Leader Poster

Lucy Stone, 1818-1893. Paying for her own education, she became the first woman in Massachusetts to earn a four year college degree and is part of the first group of female graduates in the entire nation. Stone became a paid lecturer which was extremely radical for a woman and she was one of the best! Stone spoke at political events around the country. In 1869, she co-founded the American Woman Suffrage Society. The following year, she was one of two female delegates to the Massachusetts Republican state convention. Stone also founded, published and edited the Woman's Journal, one of the most important and longest published paper for women's rights and women's issues. Stone was one of the first women in history to insist on keeping her MAIDEN name when she got married in 1855!!!! She reasoned that giving up her name was also giving up part of her identity and her new husband, Henry Blackwell always supported and encouraged her independence as a person. Fun fact: If you kept your maiden name, you can call yourself a member of the “Lucy Stone League,” or a “Lucy Stoner.” The term is archaic now but was well known in the first half of the 20th Century.