Page:The part taken by women in American history.djvu/722

Rh Mrs. Ada Miser Kepley, inheriting strong anti-slavery principles from both maternal and paternal ancestors, this intense hatred of slavery took with her the form of hatred for the bodily slavery to alcoholic drink. And although she studied law and later was ordained a minister in the Unitarian denomination, Mrs. Kepley will be best remembered for her work for the abolition of alcoholic drinking and of the laws which tended to perpetuate that evil habit. In her law practice she made a specialty of exposing the hidden roots of the liquor trade in her town and county of Illinois. Through the paper Friend at Home which she edited, her readers learned who were the granters, grantees, petitioners and bondsmen for all the liquor shops there. She and her husband built in Effingham, 111., "The Temple," a beautiful building which was made the headquarters for the Woman's Christian Temperance Union, prohibition and general reform work.

Mrs. Narcissa Edith White Kinney found her place in the white ribbon ranks in the fall of 1880, bringing to the work the discipline of a thoroughly drilled student and successful teacher. Her first relation to the Woman's Christion Temperance Union was as president of the local union in her town, Grove City, Pennsylvania, and next of her own county, Mercer, where she built up the work in a systematic way. She did an immense amount of thorough effective work, lecturing, writing and pledging legislatures to the hygiene bill, for she had made herself a specialist in that department after much study in regard to the best method of teaching hygiene to the young. In 1888 she was sent to assist the Woman's Christian Temperance Union of Washington State in securing from the legislature the enactment of temperance laws, and, under her persuasive eloquence and wise leadership, the most stringent scientific temperance laws ever enacted were passed by a unanimous vote of both houses, also in spite of the bitter opposition of the liquor trade a local option bill was passed submitting to the vote of the people the prohibition of liquor traffic in each precinct. Miss White assisted in that campaign and had the gratification of seeing prohibition approved by a majority vote. After her marriage she came to reside permanently in Astoria in Oregon, and she liberally supported the Chautauqua movement for temperance in that state.

Mrs. Janette Hill Knox, in 1881, was elected president of the New Hampshire State Woman's Christian Temperance Union, and as the responsibilities connected with that office drew her out from the quieter duties of home to perform those demanded by her public work, her executive ability developed and the steady and successful growth of the Woman's Christian Temperance Union during the years she held office bore testimony to the strength of her work. Her re-election year by year was practically unanimous.

Mrs. Mary Torans Lathrop was licensed to preach in Michigan in 1871, and was laboring as an evangelist when the woman's crusade swept over the state. She took an active part in the crusade, was one of the founders of the Woman's Christian Temperance Union, and in 1882 was made president of the state union of Michigan. Gradually her work became that of organization and she labored in various states as a strong helper in securing scientific instruction laws, in Michigan, Nebraska and Dakota amendment campaigns. In 1878 she secured the passage of a bill in the Michigan legislature appropriating thirty