Historical Society Ghost Walk Part 3: Trailblazer educator, business owner, activist, Elizabeth Colley
June 5, 2021 | By Cheryl CaseyEditor’s Note: Below is a written version of the presentation by Cheryl Casey of the Waterbury Historical Society on educator, business owner and suffragist Elizabeth Colley made as part of the Memorial Day Ghost Walk at Hope Cemetery. It was one of three presentations made at the event.
Elizabeth Colley was buried with other members of her family in New Hampshire, where she was born in January of 1840.
At the Memorial Day Ghost Walk, Cheryl Casey delivers her talk about Elizabeth Colley’s contributions to the Waterbury community and women’s suffrage movement in the early 20th century. Photo by Lisa Scagliotti
We are standing in this spot and telling her story for two reasons:
By 1875, Colley had moved to Waterbury Center and purchased the Green Mountain Seminary from the Free Will Baptists. She became its principal and teacher of Latin and French for the next 20 years.
A Waterbury Record newspaper article from August 1895 described how “her indomitable perseverance built up the school, added the [Minard] Commercial department, built the boarding house, and made the school the equal of any fitting school in our State.”
But Colley wasn’t just breaking boundaries as a woman who owned and ran a school, or in her efforts in the education of Waterbury Center’s youngsters. By the late 1880s, Colley had become widely recognized across New England for her activism, especially in the women’s suffrage movement and the intertwined movement for temperance. In 1884, Colley was the first woman to be awarded an honorary degree by a co-ed college -- Bates College in Maine.
Casey chose the gravesite of Hanna French Merriam and her daughter Rebecca Merriam Forrest, both signers to a petition calling for women’s voting rights, to deliver her presentation. Photo by Lisa Scagliotti
The suffrage movement in Vermont can be traced back to 1870, and there are eight women buried here at Hope Cemetery who were among the signers of a petition to the Vermont legislature in 1870 for the right to vote. Hannah French Merriam and her daughter Rebecca Merriam Forrest [buried here] are two of those women. The other six are Olivia Atherton Drew, Lucina Cooley Royce and her daughter Katherine Royce Henry, Lucia Mills, Sarah Hutchins, Alma Atkins Wells and her daughter Fannie Wells, and Matilda Gale Henry.
The petition itself was unsuccessful, but by the end of the decade, the efforts of these eight women and other suffragists in the state were starting to pay off. In 1880, the Vermont Legislature granted tax-paying women the right to vote in school district meetings. They were also able to hold school offices and serve as school superintendents or town clerks.
Colley was elected president of the Vermont branch of the Women’s Christian Temperance Union in 1888. Many of the organization’s members also became involved with the Vermont Woman Suffrage Association, providing the suffrage movement in Vermont with a solid contingent of experienced leadership. Colley was among them. In 1893, Colley submitted a second petition to the Vermont Legislature to pass a women’s suffrage bill; we do not have a copy of the petition itself to know the names of the signees, but we do have record of 17 Waterbury women, in addition to Colley, having signed it.
When the Vermont Senate defeated the bill after it passed the House, Colley delivered an impassioned and well-received address to the New England Woman Suffrage Association meeting in Burlington, showcasing her skills as a practiced and polished public speaker.
In 1900, the Vermont Woman Suffrage Association elected Colley as president. As the movement in Vermont continued to collect small victories across the state, Colley pushed on at the forefront of women’s activism in the region. The New England suffrage group members elected Colley as vice president of the Vermont contingent in 1911. She also held leadership roles in the Grand Army of the Republic Woman’s Relief Corps, serving as vice president in 1903 and chaplain in 1913.
By 1917, Vermont’s tax-paying women could vote in town meetings.
On the national scene, momentum was building for the constitutional amendment that would need two-thirds of the states in the union to grant approval. Vermont did not act in time to be in that critical group of states.
Governor Percival Clement vetoed the Legislature’s 1919 passage of full suffrage and then refused to call a special legislative session to ratify the 19th Amendment to the Constitution. Vermont thus missed being among the 36 states needed to ratify the 19th Amendment.
One can imagine Colley’s frustration and disappointment when suffrage seemed within reach. Vermont women prepared to deal Clement a punishing blow. Following the federal adoption of the 19th Amendment, more than 10,000 women cast their votes in Vermont’s Republican gubernatorial primary which saw Clement’s chosen successor lose to James Hartness, a supporter of the 19th Amendment. According to the Vermont Historical Society, an estimated 75% of women’s votes went to Hartness that year.
Vermont eventually ratified the 19th Amendment on February 8, 1921.
As a Waterbury educator, business owner, and leader, Colley broke boundaries on a number of fronts.
First, she never married. For that time, a single, completely self-sufficient woman who was also active in public life was a rarity.
Second, she didn’t simply work for a living – she owned her businesses. After Green Mountain Seminary, Colley owned and operated the Green Mountain Lodge, a 15-bedroom house on three acres along Route 100 in Waterbury Center. She hosted visitors from May to December for $9-$14 per week, spending her winters at the home of local friend, Mrs. V. G. Crossett.
Elizabeth Colley (far left, standing) and women’s suffrage activists in an undated photo taken at the Green Mountain Seminary in Waterbury Center. Photo courtesy Waterbury Historical Society.
And, finally, she did these things while playing a prominent role in the suffrage movement in New England, which impacted the lives of generations of girls and women.
Colley’s obituary in the Waterbury Record noted that she had seemed in good health until suffering a stroke in early January 1925. A month later, in the early hours of February 2, she died at Crossett’s home. The Waterbury Record proclaimed: “Her ideas were always of the highest and the community has continually felt her influence.”
On February 18, Lewis Moody of the Green Mountain Seminary Class of 1893 published a poem in the Waterbury Record in tribute to both the Seminary and Principal Colley. An excerpt memorializes her:
“Chiefest of all, Miss Elizabeth Colley,
Patiently toiling through many a year,
Principal, teacher, rebuker of folly,
Facing impossible tasks without fear.
Single her purpose, to make men and matrons
Worthy to stand in the presence of God;
Fortunate, all, who have once been her patrons;
Blessed the pathway her footsteps have trod.”
Colley embodied the civic ideals of her day, dedicated to serving others and committed to working for women’s rights to participate at the ballot box as full citizens of the United States.
Cheryl Casey is president of the Waterbury Historical Society and a contributor to Waterbury Roundabout.