08-02-2025
Suffragist from Schuylkill fought for women's right to vote
Ida Porter Boyer, a Schuylkill County woman who played a leading role in the women's suffrage movement, is on track to being honored with a Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission marker.
J. Robert 'Jay' Zane, Schuylkill County Historical Society president, indicated the commission has given tentative approval for a marker in Middleport, where Boyer was born in 1859 and spent her early childhood.
In the society's recent newsletter, Zane said he expected Boyer would meet the commission's new, stricter requirements for historical markers.
The encouraging news comes as the nation celebrates the 105th anniversary of the passage of the 19th amendment to the Constitution of the United States.
The amendment, which guarantees women the right to vote, was ratified on Aug. 18, 1920.
For more than 30 years, Boyer worked tirelessly for the passage of the amendment in Pennsylvania, Oklahoma, Oregon and Michigan as a member of the National American Woman Suffrage Association. The organization was founded by Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton.
Boyer represented Pennsylvania at the NAWSA convention in Washington in February 1904, where she presented the report of the organization's Committee on Legislation for Civil Rights.
The Library of Congress has a collection of Boyer's notes on the suffrage movement on file in its archive.
On the 100th anniversary of the 19th Amendment, Zane published a biography entitled 'Ida Porter Boyer: Schuylkill County's Forgotten Suffragist.'
'She was a national suffrage organizer who championed the right of women to vote, and her work is largely unknown in Schuylkill County,' Zane told the Pottsville Republican in 2020. 'I consider her one of the leading women in the history of Schuylkill County.'
The daughter of John Porter and Elizabeth Kleckner Porter, Ida was raised in Mahanoy City and Lost Creek.
A captain in the Civil War, John Porter instilled in his daughters the notion that they could achieve anything they desired.
Starting as a teacher in the Lost Creek School, she taught in Reading and ran a private school in Harrisburg. As a Pottsville Chronicle reporter, she covered the 1893 World's Fair in Chicago, which had an exhibit on women's suffrage.
Ida Porter Boyer, a Middleport native, was a leader in the women's suffrage movement. CONTRIBUTED PHOTO
In 1894, she argued women should be granted full suffrage in an essay that placed third in a national contest. The same year, she testified before Congress with Susan B. Anthony, one of the foremost suffragists.
Boyer also ghost wrote a biography of Lucy Stone, a Massachusetts suffragist and abolitionist.
She was a leader in the Indian Woman's Suffrage League in Oklahoma, the Michigan Equal Suffrage Association and a founder of the Massachusetts League of Women Voters.
Proud of her 'coal cracker' roots, Boyer possessed wit and charm that disarmed many of her opponents.
Her essay advocating granting women the right to vote was published in the Illustrated American magazine on May 26, 1894. It is reprinted in Zane's book.
'Woman suffrage Is not coming, it has come and stands knocking at the door of our Republic,' Boyer wrote. 'Our fathers achieved emancipation from British tyranny, our brothers emancipation from slavery and our daughters will enjoy the fruits of emancipated womanhood.'
Boyer gave the keynote address at the NAWSA convention in 1904, chaired by the elderly Susan B. Anthony.
'She uses a literary scalpel with a skillful hand and cuts without causing pain,' the St Louis Republic reported.
Testifying before House and Senate Committees, Boyer called the government a ' sex aristocracy' that needed to end. The declaration thrust her into a role as national organizer and spokesperson for NAWSA.
She undertook a four-year campaign to the Oklahoma Territory in 1906, the year before it became a state. Speaking to church groups and at county fairs, she advanced the suffragist cause.
Speaking at a Boston Victory Dinner a month after the ratification of the 19th Amendment, Boyer said, 'We are at the end of the road and the beginning of a new outlook into the promised land, which is ours to take.'
In 1926, Boyer spoke at the Golden Jubilee of Lost Creek Union Chapel, which her father helped organize.
In 1943, she donated papers to Harvard University's Radcliffe Institute, which studies the history of American women.
Ida Porter Boyer died at age 92 on March 13, 1952. She was cremated, and her ashes were scattered on Cape Cod.
