Bellefontaine Cemetery in St. Louis is like the Hollywood Walk of Fame for history nerds. The list of notable people buried there is so long that the walking brochure can only spare room for a few words about each one. My friend and I went exploring the cemetery last summer, following the brochure from the… Continue reading Kate Brewington Bennett
Category: Bellefontaine Cemetery
Susan Louise Marsh
Susan Marsh was appalled. A fifteen year old girl living in an orphan asylum in St Louis had to hand over her wages to her father, to support his drinking habit. Because of antiquated sole guardianship laws still on the books in Missouri in 1912, any wages that a child made were legally her father's. … Continue reading Susan Louise Marsh
Adeline Couzins
Adeline Couzins was wounded at Vicksburg. How is that possible you ask, her being a woman? Because during the Civil War, she followed the action to help where help was needed. She was one of the founders of the St. Louis Ladies Union Aid Society, a group of women who came together to help soldiers. What that meant for Adeline was greeting… Continue reading Adeline Couzins
Edna Gellhorn
Edna Gellhorn was an activist: when something needed changed, she worked on it. Lucky for her, she had resources to help her, an activist mother, and a very supportive husband. She dabbled with food and sanitation issues before WWI, worked to ensure a safe milk supply for babies, and finally found her cause with women's voting rights. Simply put, she said "I… Continue reading Edna Gellhorn
Irma Rombauer
Irma Rombauer has helped millions of people tame the cooking "beast" with her cookbook, The Joy of Cooking. Before Julia Child, Rombauer produced a useable cookbook for the 1930's housewife. It was affordable, well-organized and included step-by-step recipes designed to save time in the kitchen. Irma (von Starkloff) Rombauer was born to a prominent German family in St. Louis in… Continue reading Irma Rombauer
Virginia Minor
Every woman who votes has Virginia Minor to thank for it. She launched the Woman Suffrage Association of Missouri in 1867, and five years later became a part of a nation-wide throwdown about women's rights. She first attempted to register to vote and when denied, her husband sued the St. Louis register of voters on… Continue reading Virginia Minor
America’s First Kindergarten
Susan Blow opened the first publicly-funded kindergarten in the United States, in the Carondalet neighborhood of St. Louis. While in Germany with her father, Susan saw first hand how Friedrich Froebel's theories (the founder of kindergarten or “children’s garden”) were being applied to early child education. She saw the importance and need back in America.… Continue reading America’s First Kindergarten
Missouri Women 