Tennessee Suffrage Movement Sites
The Tennessee Historical Commission is honored to support the on-going preservation of Suffrage Movement history across the state, through programmatic management of National Register nominations, THC historic marker approvals, Federal Historic Preservation Fund Grants, and our new Tennessee Historic Cemetery Preservation Program. In 2019, the Tennessee Historical Commission received a $250,000 pass-through appropriation from the Tennessee General Assembly to make a grant to the Tennessee Historical Society for Women’s suffrage centennial commemorations.
The Hermitage Hotel, A New National Historic Landmark
This summer, on July 28, the federal government designated the Hermitage Hotel as a National Historic Landmark. While the Hermitage Hotel has been listed in the National Register of Historic Places since July 24, 1975, for its Beaux Arts Classicism architecture, this new designation recognizes that the Hermitage Hotel is an exceptional nationally significant building that played a decisive role in the Women’s Suffrage movement. National Historic Landmark status is the highest federal historic designation that a property may receive, and the Hermitage Hotel is one of only 30 National Historic Landmarks in Tennessee.
Since August 2020, guests entering the Hermitage Hotel, Tennessee’s only National Historic Landmark Hotel, are greeted with the new historic plaque featured left of the grand structure’s entrance. (designation details, page 6) Opened in 1910, this iconic hotel was named 2020 Historic Hotel of The Year by Historic Hotels of America, a program of the National Trust for Historic Preservation. Photograph by Keith Wood
A display of artifacts from 1920, when suffrage leaders--pro and anti--were headquartered in the Hermitage Hotel are on view in the hotel lobby through the centennial year. Photograph by Keith Wood.
National Register of Historic Places Sites
Crosthwaite Hall
1046 Dr DB Todd Jr Blvd, Nashville, TN
Listed in the National Register of Historic Places in 1978 as a non-contributing resource to the Fisk University Historic District. Suffragist, Minnie Lou Crosthwaite served as Fisk University Registrar.
Guilford Sr. & Anne Dallas Dudley House
5401 Hillsboro Pike, Nashville, TN
Listed in the National Register of Historic Places in 2003. Anne Dallas Dudley was the president of the first Nashville Equal Suffrage League and is credited for bringing the National Suffrage Convention to Nashville in 1915.
Tennessee State Capitol
600 Dr. MLK Jr. Drive, Nashville, TN
Listed in the National Register of Historic Places in 1970 for architectural, military, and political significance and designated as a National Historic Landmark in 1971. The final vote for ratification of the 19th Amendment occurred at the TN State Capitol on August 18, 1920.
Woman’s Club of Murfreesboro
221 East College Street, Murfreesboro, TN
Listed in the National Register of Historic Places in the North Maney Avenue Historic Overlay District in 1985. Built in 1856 and purchase by the Woman’s Club in 1916, the year of the club’s establishment, Murfreesboro’s Equal Suffrage League also used the facility for meetings and social events.
National Register listed sites featuring Suffrage sculpture
The “Equality Trailblazers” Memphis Suffrage Monument, at the University of Memphis Law School
The Tennessee Woman Suffrage Monument, on the Centennial Park Walking Trail, Nashville
The Tennessee Woman Suffrage Memorial, in the Market Square Mall, Knoxville
Detail of the Tennessee Woman Suffrage Monument located on the Centennial Park Walking Trail in Nashville. THC Ex. Dir./SHPO, Patrick McIntyre, was among the dedication speakers, August 18, 2020. Sculptor: Alan LeQuire. Photograph by Keith Wood.
HISTORIC MARKERS
Camden
Mary Cordelia Beasley-Hudson East Main Street
Senator Mildred Jolly Lashlee East Main Street
Chattanooga
Abby Crawford Milton Georgia Ave. @ McCallie Ave.
Clarksville
Austin Peay North 3rd Street
Livingston
Kate Bradford Stockton 701 Byrdstown Highway
Memphis
Marion Scudder Griffin 165 Madison Avenue
Elizabeth Avery Meriwether (formerly located) N. Front St.
Mary Church Terrell Church Park
Ida B. Wells Beale Street @ Hernando Street
Nashville
Anne Dallas Dudley West End Avenue
Nettie Napier 4th Avenue South
Frankie J. Pierce 2700 Heiman Street
Niota
Harry Thomas Burn, Sr. U.S. Highway 11
HISTORIC CEMETERY GRAVESITES
Camden
Camden City Cemetery Mary Cordella Beasley-Hudson (1851-1920)
Chattanooga
Forest Hills Cemetery Abby Crawford Milton (1881-1991)
Clarksville
Greenwood Cemetery Austin Peay (1876-1927)
Jamestown
Stockton Cemetery Kate Bradford Stockton (1880-1969)
Memphis
Elmwood Cemetery Marion Scudder Griffin (1879-1957)
Nashville
Greenwood Cemetery
Georgia Bradford Boyd (1884-1952), Mattie Eliza Howard Coleman (1870-1943), Hattie S. Smith Jackson (1855-1946), Nettie DeElla Langston Napier (1861-1938), Juno Frankie Seay Pierce (1864-1954), and Josie English Wells (1878-1921)
Mt. Olivet Cemetery Anne Dallas Dudley (1876-1955)
Niota
Niota Cemetery Harry Thomas Burn, Sr. (1895-1977)
Memorialized as the first president of the Women’s Missionary Council, Dr. Mattie Eliza Howard Coleman is honored on a tombstone that marks the 75th anniversary of the Council that was formed in 1918. Birth and death dates of the revered female leader, educator, and physician who was laid to rest in Greenwood Cemetery in 1943 are recorded on the reverse side. Greenwood, the second African American cemetery in Nashville, was established in 1888 by Preston Taylor, who was born into slavery in 1849. Photograph by Susan McClamroch