One honoree is Hazel Schmoll, an alumna who became the first CU Boulder graduate to land a Vassar faculty position

As the United States celebrates the centennial of the 19th Amendment giving women the right to vote, the Colorado Women’s Hall of Fame has set out to tell the stories of some of the Colorado Women’s Hall of Fame Inductees who fought for the largest expansion of the voting rights in U.S. history with an online exhibit on Google Arts and Culture. 

One of those stories is Hazel Schmoll (pictured at top of page), a University of Colorado Boulder graduate who became the first CU graduate to land a Vassar faculty position. There, she promoted the Women’s Suffrage Amendment on campus, which would give women the right to vote.

The pioneer spirit of Colorado, coupled with the determination of local suffragists such as Ellis Meredith (the Susan B. Anthony of Colorado), Molly Brown and Sarah Platt-Decker resulted in the 1893 ratification of women’s suffrage into Colorado law.  

This made Colorado one of the first states to grant female citizens the right to vote—and the first state in U.S. history to do so by popular vote as opposed to executive order or legislative action. It wasn’t until more than 20 years later that all women in the country were granted that right.

The exhibit explores the contributions of local activists as they earned the right to vote for the women of Colorado, then set their sights on enfranchising women across the nation.

“The ratification of the 19th Amendment was the culmination of decades of dissonance, bold ambition, and unwavering determination,” says Deborah Radman, Chair of the Colorado Women’s Hall of Fame. “The exhibit honors the enduring contributions of Colorado’s suffragists and the profound influence of the right to vote.” 

In the decades that followed women’s suffrage in Colorado, women across the nation stood on the shoulders of the bold women before them that fought for and won the right to vote. 

Members of the public can unfold the narrative of Colorado’s suffragists from Julia “Anna” Archibald Holmes, the secretary of the National Woman Suffrage Association, to Elizabeth Eyre Pellett, who marched as a suffragist in New York, and Dr. Alida Avery, who was elected as the first president of the Colorado Women Suffrage Association and is being inducted into the Colorado Women’s Hall of Fame this March.

The exhibit can be viewed at this link.

Since 1985 the Colorado Women’s Hall of Fame has inducted 172 women of various races, backgrounds, economic levels, career choices, political philosophies, and religious beliefs united by their outstanding contributions to society.

To learn more about inductees, visit: https://www.cogreatwomen.org/inductees/women-in-the-hall/