a biography of the day-eliza l. sprout turner (suffragist, feminist, poet, clubwoman)

[niyad]

Turner, Eliza L. Sproat (1826-20 June 1903), poet, suffragist, and women's club leader, was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, the daughter of a Vermont farmer who was later engaged in literary work, and Maria Lutwyche, who had immigrated to Philadelphia from Birmingham, England, around 1818. Very few details are known about her childhood, but her father apparently died when she was still a girl, and Eliza lived with her mother and brother. Though details of her education are unknown, she seems to have been well educated. She taught in the Philadelphia public schools for several years and at Girard College from 1850 to 1852.
During these years Eliza also began publishing prose and poetry for a number of newspapers and magazines. Her first published piece, "The Enchanted Lute," appeared in the Christian Keepsake in 1847. She published several prose pieces in the National Era, the magazine that first published the serial version of Uncle Tom's Cabin in 1852. One of her most popular pieces was a satire called "The Rooster-Pecked Wife," a literary contribution to the early feminist movement. Her talents were widely recognized by contemporaries, and her work was included in several anthologies of women's writing in the 1840s and 1850s. Many of her poems were published in Sartain's Magazine and Graham's Magazine. In 1872 Boston publisher James R. Osgood issued a collection of her poetry titled Out-of-Door Rhymes.

In 1855 Eliza Sproat married Nathaniel Randolph, an orthodox Quaker and wealthy lumber merchant. After a brief but happy marriage, her husband died of unknown causes, leaving her a sizable estate. The couple had one son, who later attended the University of Pennsylvania and became a physician. After her husband's death, Eliza Randolph shared her home with her mother and two close friends. She paid tribute to one of these companions, Margaret Burleigh, in the poem "An Angel's Visit." According to the introduction to Out-of-Door Rhymes, the atmosphere of her family's home was "wholly in sympathy" with contemporary thought on the "subject of women being treated in their work and lives with the same respect and remuneration that is accorded men" (1903, p. 11).
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Eliza Turner continued to write and to work on behalf of reform. Her efforts in both pursuits reflected her interests in women's issues. In 1869 she helped establish the Pennsylvania Woman Suffrage Association, serving as its first corresponding secretary. In 1875 she published the suffrage tract Four Quite New Reasons Why You Should Want Your Wife to Vote. Her writings focused on social problems, relationships, and women's concerns. For example, the 1887 story "Nobody to Blame" concerned the frustrations of a city-born woman turned farmer's wife at having "a mind that is never consulted, a will that is never respected" (introduction to Out-of-Door Rhymes [1903], p. 15). Turner also contributed a number of nonfiction articles on the status of women to the Boston Woman's Journal and other magazines.

In the 1870s and 1880s Turner was a leader in Philadelphia reform efforts, including the Women's Congress held during the Philadelphia Centennial Exposition of 1876. She edited and wrote articles for the New Century for Women, a newspaper printed and distributed at the Women's Pavilion of the exposition. At the Women's Congress, Turner delivered a paper on women's clubs that stimulated interested women to create a club in Philadelphia, which culminated in the formation of the New Century Club the following year. One of the founding members, Turner served as the first corresponding secretary and as president from 1879 to 1881. In addition to the social and literary programs common to late nineteenth-century women's clubs, the New Century Club also directed its efforts toward aiding members of the community. In 1881 Turner chaired a club committee that organized evening classes for working women and girls. By 1882 the project's success led to the formation of a second organization, the New Century Guild of Working Women. The guild offered classes in traditional vocational subjects such as cooking, dressmaking, millinery, and bookkeeping, but it also became a working-woman's club, providing study groups in history and philosophy, a clubhouse, a library, and a dining room. In 1892 the Drexel Institute took over the classes, but the guild remained active as a club with hundreds of members.

In keeping with Turner's lifelong interest in working-class women's issues and charitable concerns, she was active in a number of Philadelphia organizations. In 1875 she organized the Children's Country Week Association of Philadelphia, a program modeled on her own practice of inviting poor city children to her country estate for week-long summer vacations. When a committee formed to organize a consumer's league in Philadelphia, Turner became one of the founding members. She also served as a director of the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals and worked with the Philadelphia Society for Organizing Charity. Though she did not live long enough to see her efforts rewarded, she also remained active in the cause of woman suffrage. Turner died at her home just eight months after the death of her husband. The New Century Club, the New Century Guild of Working Women, and the Children's Country Week Association continued to be active legacies late into the twentieth century, attesting to the successful efforts of Turner and her contemporaries to influence the emerging urban, industrial order at the turn of the century.

http://www.anb.org/articles/15/15-01074.html