100 Years of Service: SI/New York City, NY (North Atlantic Region)
Congratulations to SI/New York City, NY (North Atlantic Region), who celebrated the 100th anniversary of its chartering on June 27, 1923!
The New York City club was the sixth Soroptimist club formed and the fifth chartered directly by Stuart Morrow. It was also the last U.S. club he chartered for several years, as he turned his attentions across the Atlantic in London and Paris before returning to America.
Unlike the clubs that preceded it, information about SI/New York City’s chartering is a bit of a mystery. Perhaps because the city was so large with so much happening, there is little information available now in publicly available newspapers. The only news story found from the chartering period is a New York Times article published on June 21, 1923, which announced the election of the club’s first officers. There were 102 charter members.
The club’s officers were an impressive group, and many had deep associations with other woman-focused organizations.
Mary Rutter Towle
(Photo credit: Wikimedia)
Charter president, Mary Rutter Towle, an attorney, was an assistant U.S. district attorney, and was the first woman to hold that position in a federal judicial district east of the Mississippi. A suffragist, she served as the general counsel for the National American Woman Suffrage Association from 1913 through 1919.
Virginia Wheat, the first vice president, came from the New York School for Secretaries.
Second vice president Grace Thompson Seton was a writer using the pen name Dorothy Dodge and vice president of the National Penwomen. Grace was also a former suffragist who served as president of the Connecticut Woman Suffrage Association during the push for the 19th amendment in the United States.
Third vice president, Sara Coe, an author, was active with the New York State Federation of Women’s Clubs and the League of Women Writers; she was also known as one of the social leaders of New York society at that time.
Rose Bingham, a public accountant, served as treasurer.
Helen Bridges, a stenographer, was the recording secretary. Helen would go on to be the first secretary of the American Federation of Soroptimist Clubs (SIA’s first name) when the federation was first formed in 1928.
Dora Lewis, SI/New York City, NY, member and 1960-1962 SIA President
(Photo credit: SIA archives)
However illustrious a group of members, the club’s 1935 history makes clear there were serious internal difficulties almost immediately. Helen Ball, the club’s president in 1935 wrote: “During the first year there was considerable dissension in the club and it was so bad that a few members decided to disorganize for the purpose of getting rid of five members they did not wish. The 102 charter members, therefore, were lost…”
In an unusual circumstance, a second charter was presented to the club by Stuart Morrow upon its re-organization in October 1924, and shows 35 charter members. However, this re-charter is not otherwise reflected in the early records accumulated by the federation’s first historian, Helena Gamble.
After this re-charter, the club stabilized and flourished. In the late 1920s, it echoed many other early Soroptimist clubs and started significant work in the realm of women’s employment issues. Later Dora S. Lewis, a professor at Hunter College who was elected club president in 1951, went on to serve as the federation’s president from 1960 to 1962.
From the promise of its original 1923 chartering, and its unusual re-chartering fifteen months later, the club continues to flourish in its service to the women and girls of the New York area.
SIA Headquarters sends its congratulations to all the members of SI/New York City —past and present—on achieving this noteworthy anniversary!
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