08/27/2021
Today, on this historic day, we are happy to induct Marguerite Newburgh and Macha Grannis into the Honoring 90 South St. Paul Women Leaders. Marguerite and Macha were two of the first women to vote in the Nation on August 27, 1920 a day after the ratification of the 19th Amendment. The vote took place right here in South St Paul 101 years ago today. Local historian Lois Glewwe penned this historic story.
Twenty-two year old Marguerite Newburgh got up at 5:15 a.m. on the morning of August 27, 1920. Skipping breakfast, she headed out the front door of the family home at 351 Fifth Avenue North for a quick walk to South St. Paul City Hall where she was a stenographer in the city engineer’s office. On this morning, though, she didn’t settle in at her desk, but grabbed the papers she needed and prepared to set up her station as an election judge.
The election itself wasn’t controversial or surprising. It was to approve a water bond bill that was to fund the establishment of city water wells “on the hill” in the residential neighborhood above Concord Street. But women all over the city were excited about the election because the day before the United States Congress had certified the 19th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution granting women across the country the right to vote. Although women in some states like Wyoming, had been voting in local and state elections for some time, the newly adopted amendment extended suffrage to every state in the Union, at least for white women. Black women and indigenous women waited years to be granted that same right in most states.
Marguerite was very excited to be an election judge for this historic occasion and at eighteen seconds after six o’clock in the morning on August 27, she cast her own ballot before taking her seat as a judge. It wasn’t long before reporters from across the nation, as well as Fox Films out of Los Angeles were descending on South St. Paul to document these historic first time voters. Marguerite described herself to a reporter from the Minnesota Star: “Oh, yes, I’m a good suffragist. I’m enthusiastic over the ratification. I’m going to study, petition and be progressive.”
Just down the block at 204 Fifth Avenue North, Macha Vance Grannis also prepared to get to City Hall by six a.m. in order to be among the first women to vote. Macha was well-known to the South St. Paul community. She graduated from Luther College of Decorah, Iowa and from Northwestern University following her high school days and in 1907 she married attorney David L. Grannis Sr. who was practicing law in Cresco, Iowa, at the time. The two came to South St. Paul that year and their sons Vance and David Jr. were born in 1908 and 1910. The following year, in 1911, Macha Grannis became one of the founders of the South St. Paul Study Club, then called the Tuesday Club. Her interest in the intellectual climate of the community also prompted her involvement in the city’s first library board, appointed by Mayor Charles W. Clark in 1916. She was to serve fifty-one years and ten months on the South St. Paul Library Board. In 1958, she was also appointed to the first Dakota County Library Board and was named to the joint board for Minnesota’s first regional library, the Dakota/Scott system. She served six years in that capacity and was honored at a tri-county testimonial dinner upon her retirement in 1964.
Her family treasures the story that on the morning of August 27, 1920, Macha and one of her best friends, Kate Michelmore, along with Kate’s daughter, Katherine, were the first three women to vote that morning. Macha often shared the story of how she and Kate had gone to enter the polling place at City Hall and Kate paused and held the door for Macha who was then the first through the door to the polling place.
Unfortunately the historical record doesn’t always match the legend. I myself told Macha’s story for years until really digging into the newspapers and records of the time. It was during this recent research that I learned about Marguerite Newburgh and how she was touted near and far as the first woman to vote in the country following ratification of the 19th Amendment.
Perhaps one reason that Marguerite’s name was lost to history is that Marguerite and her friend Eva Callan made a trip to San Francisco, California in 1921 and Marguerite ended up staying there and marrying in California. In 1924, Marguerite’s parents went to visit her and ended up relocating to San Francisco themselves. Although I connected with one of Marguerite’s great nephews in 2020, the family had no knowledge of the role Marguerite played in American history. With Marguerite and her family gone, the story of Macha Grannis being the first woman to vote on that August morning in 1920 was the only story that survived to the present day. In any case, both women number among the 90 South St. Paul Women Leaders whose stories we have related in the South St. Paul Voice this past year in honor of the 90 women who voted on that historic day.
CAPTION: Marguerite Newburgh, at left, was the first woman to vote in the U.S. on the morning following ratification of the19th Amendment to the Constitution on August 27, 1920. Macha Grannis, at right, was a prominent South St. Paul woman who has always been identified through time as that first voter. Both women share that honor now 101 years after that historic election.
