Oreola Williams Haskell

Oreola Williams Haskell (14 April 1875 – 6 September 1953) was an American activist for suffrage, author, and poet in the early twentieth century.

Early life

Haskell was born to Theodore and Martha Williams in Poultney, Vermont, on April 14, 1875, and died in Brooklyn on September 6, 1953. The Williams family moved to Brooklyn when Haskell was around five years old, shortly before her brother was born.Marsh, Janet Z. “Oreola Williams Haskell (1875-1953).” Dictionary of Literary Biography: Writers on Women's Rights and U.S. Suffrage. Edited by George Parker Anderson, Gale, 2018, pp.191.

Family

Martha J. (née Rees) Williams, mother (1854-1939)

Woman’s Who’s Who of America: A Biographical Dictionary of Contemporary Women of the United States and Canada 1914–1915. Edited by John William Leonard. The American Commonwealth Company, 1914, p.370.

Martha was herself a prominent pioneer suffragist who was very involved in her local suffrage community and society. She led, chaired, and participated in many suffrage organizations in New York City, as listed below:"MARTHA WILLIAMS, SUFFRAGIST, DEAD: Charter Member of the First Federation in Greater New York Was 85 HEADED LEAGUE IN HARLEM Widow of Newspaper Man Also Was President of Kings County Equality Group." The New York Times, 08 Oct 1939, p.48.Marsh, Janet Z. “Oreola Williams Haskell (1875-1953).” Dictionary of Literary Biography: Writers on Women's Rights and U.S. Suffrage. Edited by George Parker Anderson, Gale, 2018, pp.191.

Charter member of the Interurban Woman Suffrage Council (est.1903),Marsh, Janet Z. “Oreola Williams Haskell (1875-1953).” Dictionary of Literary Biography: Writers on Women's Rights and U.S. Suffrage. Edited by George Parker Anderson, Gale, 2018, pp.191. the first federation of suffrage clubs to be founded by Carrie Chapman Catt President of the Harlem Woman Suffrage League (also called the Harlem Equal Rights League) President of Kings County Political Equality League Press Chairman for several suffrage clubs Member of the New York Suffrage League Organizer for the New York Equal Rights Association Historian for the New York State Woman Suffrage Association Chairman of the Philanthropic Committee of the New York City Federation of Women's Clubs

There is also evidence that Martha worked with Oreola, and one example is Susan B. Anthony's Brooklyn birthday party press release. While Oreola represented the Elizabeth Cady Stanton Political Equality League and had the role of youth outreach, Martha was responsible for press relations. Due to the overlap in Martha and Oreola's leadership experience, it is likely that working alongside her mother gave her the experience and network to follow in her footsteps, at least to some degree.

Theodore Williams, father Theodore was a journalist, editor and poet,"MARTHA WILLIAMS, SUFFRAGIST, DEAD: Charter Member of the First Federation in Greater New York Was 85 HEADED LEAGUE IN HARLEM Widow of Newspaper Man Also Was President of Kings County Equality Group." The New York Times, 08 Oct 1939, p.48.Marsh, Janet Z. “Oreola Williams Haskell (1875-1953).” Dictionary of Literary Biography: Writers on Women's Rights and U.S. Suffrage. Edited by George Parker Anderson, Gale, 2018, pp.191. and president of the Evolution Club of which Martha, Oreola, and Robert were all active members.

He wrote poetry under the pseudonym Tudor Williams, and edited for the Associated Press and Leslie's Weekly.Marsh, Janet Z. “Oreola Williams Haskell (1875-1953).” Dictionary of Literary Biography: Writers on Women's Rights and U.S. Suffrage. Edited by George Parker Anderson, Gale, 2018, pp.191. Based on Oreola's publication records, it maybe possible that it was through her father's connections that she was published in Leslie's Weekly, rather than purely based on merit.

Harold Williams, brother (1879–)

Not much is known about Harold.

Robert Hutchins Haskell, husband (1874–1965)

Robert was born in Brooklyn on October 31, 1874, and met Oreola while they were both editing the Era at Cornell. After graduating university, he attended New York Law School while working as a journalist, and graduated in 1898. According to the Cornell Alumni News, he was a "war correspondent for the New York Herald." He became an attorney, and married Oreola on April 8, 1901, at the Unity Church in Brooklyn.Woman’s Who’s Who of America: A Biographical Dictionary of Contemporary Women of the United States and Canada 1914-1915. Edited by John William Leonard. The American Commonwealth Company, 1914, p.370.Marsh, Janet Z. “Oreola Williams Haskell (1875-1953).” Dictionary of Literary Biography: Writers on Women's Rights and U.S. Suffrage. Edited by George Parker Anderson, Gale, 2018, pp.192. He was the leader of the Farmer-Labor Party of Brooklyn. He died at age 90 in his home in St. Petersburg, Florida, on March 20, 1965, after retiring from practice in 1962.

Grace Vivian Haskell, daughter (1907–1999) Grace was born on November 22, 1907, in New York. She married Hilmer N. Torner on Feb 23, 1954, in Elkton, Cecil, Maryland. She died on March 2, 1999, in Saint Petersburg, Pinellas, Florida, at age 91.

She helped her mother with some of her society work (specifically the Brooklyn Sittig Christmas Tree Society, which you can learn more about here), alongside Katheryn Beyea, but it is unclear whether she participated in her mother's suffrage activism. In her obituary, she is listed as a homemaker.St. Petersburg Times (FL), March 4, 1999.

Education

Haskell graduated the Girl's High School in Brooklyn NY and was named the Class Poet.Woman’s Who’s Who of America: A Biographical Dictionary of Contemporary Women of the United States and Canada 1914-1915. Edited by John William Leonard. The American Commonwealth Company, 1914, p.370. At age 17, she founded and presided over the Oreola Progressive Society.Marsh, Janet Z. “Oreola Williams Haskell (1875-1953).” Dictionary of Literary Biography: Writers on Women's Rights and U.S. Suffrage. Edited by George Parker Anderson, Gale, 2018, pp.191. She continued her education at Cornell and received a bachelor's degree in Philosophy. While at Cornell, Haskell was on the editorial boards for two student publications, the Era and the Magazine, and won a prize from the former. She was a member and Winter Term President of the Sennightly sororityMarsh, Janet Z. “Oreola Williams Haskell (1875-1953).” Dictionary of Literary Biography: Writers on Women's Rights and U.S. Suffrage. Edited by George Parker Anderson, Gale, 2018, pp.191. and was named Class Poet by her peers

Career and personal life

Until her later marriage with Robert H. Haskell, Haskell worked as a public school teacher in Brooklyn.Woman’s Who’s Who of America: A Biographical Dictionary of Contemporary Women of the United States and Canada 1914-1915. Edited by John William Leonard. The American Commonwealth Company, 1914, p.370. Together they had a daughter, Grace Vivian Haskell. Haskell was a prolific author, writing her own novel (see Banner Bearers below) and contributing to magazines such as Judge regularly. Haskell was devoted to the suffrage cause, and worked alongside famous suffragists such as Carrie Chapman Catt and Mary Garrett Hay.Marsh, Janet Z. “Oreola Williams Haskell (1875-1953).” Dictionary of Literary Biography: Writers on Women's Rights and U.S. Suffrage. Edited by George Parker Anderson, Gale, 2018, pp.191. Ida Husted Harper, who wrote the introduction to Banner Bearers, commended her for her modesty and lack of interest in the limelight,Marsh, Janet Z. “Oreola Williams Haskell (1875-1953).” Dictionary of Literary Biography: Writers on Women's Rights and U.S. Suffrage. Edited by George Parker Anderson, Gale, 2018, pp.191. which was very much in line with the self-sacrificing attitude that Haskell attributed to suffragists in her works. Her quiet, efficient, hardworking attitude was also noted in an interview she had with the Brooklyn Daily Eagle in 1915, as a prime example of the faceless army of diligent suffragists who worked behind the scenes. Alongside her suffrage activism and high society work (predominantly philanthropy), she was an auditor and recording secretary of the New York Federation for Women's Clubs, and as of 1914 she was the patroness of the Brooklyn Sittig Christmas Tree Society.Woman’s Who’s Who of America: A Biographical Dictionary of Contemporary Women of the United States and Canada 1914-1915. Edited by John William Leonard. The American Commonwealth Company, 1914, p.370. Though her contributions to the suffrage movement in New York have not garnered much attention from historians, her plethora of appearances in the Brooklyn Daily Eagle newspaper suggest that she was a well-known and respected figure of the time.

Haskell was a Unitarian, and her hobbies were theater, outdoor sports, and walking.Woman’s Who’s Who of America: A Biographical Dictionary of Contemporary Women of the United States and Canada 1914-1915. Edited by John William Leonard. The American Commonwealth Company, 1914, p.370.

Works Marsh, Janet Z. “Oreola Williams Haskell (1875-1953).” Dictionary of Literary Biography: Writers on Women's Rights and U.S. Suffrage. Edited by George Parker Anderson, Gale, 2018, pp.190.

Book

Banner Bearers: tales of the Suffrage Campaigns, with an introduction by Ida Husted Harper (Geneva, N.Y.: W. F. Humphrey, 1920) As a fictional work that exemplified the modernist literary movement of the time, Banner Bearers was possibly the first epistolary style novel in suffrage literature.Finnegan, Margaret. Selling Suffrage: Consumer Culture and Votes for Women. Columbia UP, p.108, 205. The novel was inspired by the suffrage referendums in New York between 1915 and 1917, and its depictions of that time have been praised and credited by suffragists as greatly influential in the passing of the Nineteenth Amendment.Finnegan, Margaret. Selling Suffrage: Consumer Culture and Votes for Women. Columbia UP, p.108. The twenty-two different yet related voices in the novel provide a more complex, diverse representation of suffragist voices, making it a more mature depiction of the successes and failures of the suffrage movement.Finnegan, Margaret. Selling Suffrage: Consumer Culture and Votes for Women. Columbia UP, pp.143-144. Haskell modeled many of the twenty-two characters on actual suffragists, and as the Daily Brooklyn Eagle revealed in its review of the book, the true identities may have been obvious to contemporaries of the novel (which suggests the book was possibly meant to be an inside joke). According to the article, the stories and corresponding identities are as follows: "Mrs. Rensling Takes a Rest" - Mrs. George Notman "Tenements and Teacups" - Mrs. Emilie Lockwood "A Musical Martyr" - Mrs. Anna Ross Weeks "Sizing Up a Boss" - Mary Garrett Hay (known affectionately as "boss") "The Heart of a Chief" - Carrie Chapman Catt. Other identities revealed in the article that are not accompanied by story title are: Mrs. Norman de B. Whitehouse, Dr. Anna Howard Shaw, Mrs. F. Louis Slade (Mrs. Caroline McCormick Slade), Mrs. Charles L. Tiffany, and Miss Rose Schneidermann.Marsh, Janet Z. “Oreola Williams Haskell (1875-1953).” Dictionary of Literary Biography: Writers on Women's Rights and U.S. Suffrage. Edited by George Parker Anderson, Gale, 2018, pp.195.

Periodical publications (non-exhaustive)

Poems Among other publications, Haskell contributed poems relating to aspects of city life to the Judge, Leslie's Weekly, McCall's, The Club Woman magazine, and the Housekeeper.Woman’s Who’s Who of America: A Biographical Dictionary of Contemporary Women of the United States and Canada 1914-1915. Edited by John William Leonard. The American Commonwealth Company, 1914, p.370.Marsh, Janet Z. “Oreola Williams Haskell (1875-1953).” Dictionary of Literary Biography: Writers on Women's Rights and U.S. Suffrage. Edited by George Parker Anderson, Gale, 2018, pp.192.