Jun 5, 1914, Page 7 Altamont, New York, US
MANY TO MARCH IN SUFFRAGE PARADE Votes for Women Enthusiasts to Wear White Dresses with Yellow Sashes Saturday Afternoon.
It is expected that about 700 women from Albany and vicinity will march in the votes for women parade at Albany Saturday afternoon. The marchers will wear white dresses and white hats with yellow sashes and will carry yellow flowers. Mrs. Raymond Brown of New York will lead the walking procession. There will be a delegation from Debbie Ferry and two from Poughkeepsie. Of the latter one group will be from Vanmar.
The three Albany districts will be represented by large numbers of suffragists and other groups to march are: Homemakers, college, professional, business, pioneers and librarians. The men's division will be led by the executive committee of the Men's Equal Suffrage club. Pioneers of the suffrage movement will follow the marchers in automobiles and carriages.
A mass meeting will be held Saturday night at 8 o'clock at Odd Fellows hall. A collection will be taken. The speakers will include: George Foster Peabody, Mrs. Raymond Brown, Mrs. James Lee Laidlaw, Mrs. Elsie Vandergrift and Mrs. Fransis Maule Bjorkman.
Middletown Daily Argus, 06 Jun 1914, Middletown, New York. Suffragists Gather in Albany.
Albany, June 6, Suffragists from all parts of the sate to participate in the parade and mass meeting late today and tonight. Almost a thousand members, men and women, have enrolled. The leaders declared nearly all would march. James Lee Laidlaw, of New York, George Foster Peabody, of Saratoga Springs, Mrs. Katherine Gavit, of Albany, Miss Elsie Vandergrift, Denver leaders, are here to participate.
Greenwich News, The Post-Star, Glens Falls, New York, 15 Jun 1914, Mon • Page 6
"Miss Elsie Vandergrift, the Colorado suffrage speaker, gave a lecture in the Star theater yesterday afternoon and before the Bottskill grange, in the I.O.F. hall last evening."
The Journal and Tribune, PAGE 37, Knoxville, Tennessee Sunday, June 21, 1914
WOMAN TURNS TABLES ON ANTIS
Miss Elsie Vandergrift, a well-informed young Colorado woman, highly recommended by Judge Lindsey, is now working in New York as an organizer for the Woman's Suffrage party.
Miss Vandergrift's first public appearance was at an anti-suffrage meeting in Troy, where Mr. Charles D. Underhill of Massachusetts was the speaker. Since the suffragists defeated him for the re-election to the legislature, Mr. Underhill has devoted himself to going about speaking against equal rights for women. The Woman Voter says:-
"Unconscious of what awaited him, he let his imagination run riot as to the alarming results of equal suffrage in Colorado. Miss Vandergrift, by her skill in questioning him and her ability in answering her own questions when he totally failed, brought consternation to the recently organized antis, utter confusion to the speaker of the evening, and turned an anti-suffrage meeting into a good suffrage meeting."
Suffragists on Systematic Campaign, The Buffalo Enquirer, Buffalo, New York 10 Sep 1914, Thu • Page 12
"Miss Elsie Vandergrift spoke on the laws of Colorado where women vote... All three women are members of the state organization staff. The plan the suffragists have adopted is to cover a ward each day, selecting their meeting place, and then doing their advertising by a house-to-house canvas. "
"The suffrage workers are still active. Their flying squadron, working from the headquarters for the eight campaign district… Other speakers were Miss Elsie Vandergrift. "
A Meeting of the Women's Franchise League, Palladium-Item, Richmond, Indiana, 12 Sep 1914, Sat • Page 5
"Many members of the league are interested in Miss Elsie Vandergrift, a Colorado woman voter, who attended the recent democratic convention at Saratoga. She had the following remarks to make: 'The reading of the suffrage plank was followed by one of the most dramatic moments a political convention has seen in many a day. The plank was as follows: The democratic legislature redeemed the party platform in 1912 with regard to woman suffrage. We recognize the wide spread interest in this question, and pledge ourselves to the submission of a constitutional amendment to the voters of the state either through the act of the next legislature of the constitutional convention.'"
Will Map Out Fall Suffrage Campaign, Buffalo Evening News. Buffalo, New York, Wed, Sep 16, 1914 · Page 20
"Ward canvasses are being conducted this week with evening street meetings at which Elsie Vandergrift of Denver will be a principal speaker."
Buffalo News, Thursday, Sep 24, 1914, Buffalo, NY, Page:22
FALLS SUFFRAGISTS TO HOLD STREET MEETING
NIAGARA FALLS, Sept. 24 (Special) - The local suffrage leaders, headed by F. J. Tone and Mrs. E.D. Seymore, are arranging for a street meeting, in the interest of their cause, to be held tomorrow evening in Falls street. The speakers will be Mr. Frank Shuler of Buffalo and Elsie Vandergrift, a woman voter from Denver, Colorado. 
Suffragists Plan for Street Rally: Buffalo Delegation Eager for Convention at Rochester. Buffalo Courier Buffalo, New York 27 Sep 1914, Sun • Page 69
"Miss Elsie Vandergrift, after a month's work in this district, goes to Rochester a week before the convention to handle the publicity."
Omaha World-Herald. Tuesday, Oct 06, 1914, Omaha, NE, Page:. 11
SIDEWALKS ARE BLOCKED, MERCHANTS COMPLAIN
Douglas Street Storekeepers Object to Numerous Curbstone Meetings Which Block Traffic.
Curbstone meetings along Douglas street have brown numerous and too obstructing for merchants in the block between Fifteenth and Sixteenth streets. This morning they presented a petition to Mayor Dahlman, asking that such meetings be suppressed. The merchants say the crowds collect that the sidewalk is blocked and their business is injured.
This location, which the suffragists have picked for their curbstone meetings. Their meetings, however, are not complained of particularly. Merchants say there are numerous other curbstoners besides them.
Yesterday Miss Elsie Vandergrift, speaking in the front of Combs' jewelry store, attracted such a crowd that the sidewalk on the south side of the street was entirely blocked.
Merchants complained to the police. An officer stopped Miss Vandergrift's talk to demand her permit. She did not have it with her but Mrs. George Doane rushed to suffrage headquarters and came back with ten permits. So the meeting continued and the crowd increased.
"We are not complaining especially against the suffragists," said Ell R. Needham of the Alexander Shoe Co. "We want the street kept clear of all speakers and persons selling articles."
All the stores on the street signed the petition except the Kilpatrick Co.
"Saturday night we had some inconvenience because of the suffrage meeting being so close to our door, but I believe it is a mistake to complain. The congestion is only temporary," said W. F. Baxter of the Kilpatrick Co.
Lincoln Daily Star, Oct 15, 1914, Page 10, Lincoln, Nebraska, US
Cupid Invades the Suffragist Ranks (Special to The Star). Omaha, Neb. Oct. 15 - Miss Elsie Vandergrift, exponent of women's rights will soon demonstrate the supreme right of women - that of becoming mistress of her own home, Miss Vandergrift, of her own home, Miss Vandergrift, one of the field workers for the national suffragist organization, has been on the Omaha end of long distance courtship, at the other end of which camped Ralph Benedict, a newspaper man of Denver. The newspaper laid siege to the heart of the suffragist by means of telephone and telegraph. The surrender has taken place and the wedding is scheduled in Denver for November 4, the day following what the suffragists believe will be a signal victory for Nebraska.
Miss Vandergrift, who is engaged in a precinct canvas in Omaha, is under contract to Mrs. Carrie Chapman Catt, the suffrage leader. The contract does not expire until November 1915. Because of her close proximity to her home in Denver, Miss Vandergrift has been allowed a vacation extending until January. After that date, she will continue to bear the banner of women's rights late still unconquered territory until the expiration of her contract. 
Omaha Daily Bee, Omaha, Nebraska. 02 Oct 1914, Fri • Page 5
WILL SPEAK FOR SUFFRAGE AT CITY HALL, Miss Elsie Vandergrift, Denver newspaper woman and suffrage speaker, sent to Nebraska by the National Suffrage Association.
The Omaha Daily News, Omaha, Nebraska, 18 Oct 1914, Sun • Page 8
LARGE CROWDS OUT AT SUFFRAGE TALKS
Miss Elsie Vandergrift and John A. Rine addressed the third audience in South Omaha. They were greeted with enthusiasm and made effective speeches.
Tonight at Temple Israel John L. Kennedy will speak on suffrage, and at the People's church Miss Elsie Vandergrift will make a suffrage talk.
Oct 18, 1914, Page 12, Canton, Ohio, US NEBRASKA AND SOUTH DAKOTA WOMEN MAY GET FRANCHISE. Denver, Oct. 17 - The chances of Nebraska and South Dakota granting the vote to the women at the November elections are better than ever, according to Miss Jane Addams of Hull house, Chicago, who left here today for Nevada to participate in the suffrage campaign in that state. She has just finished that state. She has just finished a series of addresses in Nebraska and South Dakota and later will campaign through Montana.
Miss Addams declared that met enthusiastic audiences everywhere. She paid a high tribute to Miss Elise Vandergrift, former newspaper woman who is now of the suffrage campaign carried on now in Nebraska.
The Nebraska State Journal, Lincoln, Nebraska, 22 Oct 1914, Thu • Page 4
SUFFRAGE WORKERS FIND MANY SIGNERS TO PLEDGE
Only three persons in fifty-seven houses canvassed in the First ward yesterday by Miss Elsie Vandergrift and Miss Jane Thompson, suffrage workers, declined to sign a pledge to support suffrage at the coming election.
"The support was perfectly wonderful," said Miss Vandergrift this morning, "Everybody was willing to sign and if the canvass yesterday was any indication we will sweep the state in November."
Miss Vandergrift and Miss Thompson will make a flying canvass of the city, working in every ward, while others will make a complete canvass of every house in the city.
SPEAKERS ARE FAR APART
Suffrage and Anti-Suffrage Arguments of a Night.
Miss Vandergrift Drew a Large Crowd Thousands Heard Speaker on 13th Streets for an Evening Meeting.
While Miss Elsie Vandergrift was telling several hundred men and women gathered at the corner of Thirteenth and O streets Wednesday night, how the women of Colorado forced Governor Ammons to call in the federal troops, Mrs. A.J. George was telling an anti-suffrage audience at the Lindell, whey the governors had to call the federals. "The women of Colorado claimed they could govern the state by moral persuasion were the first to go to the governor and say: bring in the federal troops," said Mrs. George. "The women of Colorado said to Governor Ammons, you've got to stop this bloodshed and it was stopped," said Miss Vandergrift.
The suffrage meeting on the street was attended by a crowd that nearly blocked Thirteenth street. It was largely a man crowed. Here and there, a woman voiced approval of the utterances of the young newspaper woman from Denver, but the bulk of the applause came from me. The noise from traffic and the ever-shifting crowd did not interfere with the carrying power of the voice of the woman campaigner who next week is to be married by Judge Lindsay of Denver. She was heard far beyond the outer border of the crowd. Hers was a penetrating voice as she stood in an automobile high above the heads of the crowd about her, Miss Vandergrift drove home as her feature point this statement: "Suffrage is a matter of human justice; a question of human fairness; a question of humanity itself. It is being fought by the men who are bucking humanity for their own gain.
Thousand Heard Speaker
The crowd at the corner was estimated at one thousand. Ninety percent or more were men. Miss Vandergrift was pleased by the reception. After her rapid-fire talk extending over an hour, she turned to a reporter and said: "It may take some nerve to boast of it but this is a fine crowd. They tell me it is the largest crowd that ever attended a suffrage meeting in your city. Yes, I'm to be married the day after election." The young woman who faced the big throng during an evening was the only woman when the meeting was over. Her smile spoke plainly that there are matters other than suffrage on her mind. "He is an old Nebraska boy. His name is Ralph Paine Benedict and he attended your university in 1904. Since then, he attended Harvard University and is a graduate of that institution."
Frequent applause interrupted the young speaker who showed herself to be mistress of the situation at all times. She scoffed at the theory that votes for women will double the expense of the election. Then she went on to prove her point. "Fully 95 per cent of the election expense is for printing of the ballots and rental of booths. Less than one-third more ballots will be required and the rental on the booths will be no higher so where is your doubled cost?" she asked. She took the stand that it is the great mass of women; the common women who want the ballot. "If, as our opponents would have us believe, the ballot to women will mean an advantage to bad women of the underworld, why are not these women out working for the cause?" Miss Vandergrift took exceptions to the conduct of those women who spend their hours at bridge.
Names the Opposition
She charged that the fight against suffrage is being waged by corporations, bankers and corrupt interests. She declared that the interests that were everlastingly fighting for longer hours and shorter pay were the nucleus back of the fight against suffrage. "The corporations all vote one way. The laboring men and men of the classes split their vote and a part of their strength is wasted." Her final appeal was that wage earners get together and vote solid on the question of votes for women.
The Omaha Daily News, Omaha, Nebraska, 14 Oct 1914, Wed • Page 1
Accepts a Proposal by Long-Distance Phone
Elsie Vandergrift, Suffragist, to Marry Ralph Benedict, Newspaper Man of Denver
Suffrage has sponsored another romance.
The announcement is made today that Miss Elsie Vandergrift, a newspaper woman of Denver, who is here in the interest of suffrage, and Ralph Benedict, a newspaper mand of Denver, will be married there the day after the election.
Miss Vandergrift accepted the persistent suitor over the long-distance telephone one evening last week. Judge Ben Lindsey, an intimate of the two young people, will perform the ceremony.
"I shall celebrate my wedding day and the Nebraska victory on November 4," Miss Vandergrift said.
Miss Vandergrift was formerly a political writer on the Denver Express, on which Mr. Benedict is the editorial writer.
Mr. Benedict is a Harvard graduate and Miss Vandergrift a graduate of the University of Colorado. Both are ardent suffragists and the bond of common interests drew them together from their first introduction four years ago.
Miss Vandergrift will not disclose the nature of this first meeting.
As soon as she reached Nebraska letters came thick and fast to Miss Vandergrift, urging her to cross the border and become Mrs. Benedict.
One day last week while she was campaigning in Sarpy county, a long distance call sought her all day. When she returned at 6 o'clock, dead tired, the call was still awaiting. Without more ado she accepted the proposal that came rushing over the wires.
Miss Vandergrift will leave here the night of the election-after the polls close-for Denver.
The Omaha Daily News, Omaha, Nebraska, 27 Oct 1914, Tue • Page 4
WOMEN WON FOR JUDGE LINDSEY
So Miss Elsie Vandergrift of Denver Tells Woman's Club Members.
SECURED EIGHT-HOUR LAW
"We are told by antisuffragists that women have done nothing in Colorado with the vote. In 1908 we nominated Judge Ben B. Lindsay on an independent ticket when every newspaper and party organization was fighting him and we elected him. Women voted for the protection of youth without regard to religion or politics."
Miss Elsie Vandergrift of Denver, in speaking before the social science department of the Woman's club Monday afternoon, cited the above instance of the effective use of the ballot in the hands of women in Colorado.
Continuing she said: "For years women had fought certain measures as 'non-partisan' body. These were immediately made laws when we became voters. Women were granted an eight-hour working law and equal pay for equal service with men. Industrial schools were substituted for boys' reformatories, which merely prepared them for the penitentiary," she added.
The Omaha Daily News, Omaha, Nebraska, 30 Oct 1914, Fri • Page 13
EIGHTY SUFFRAGE PRECINCT WORKERS WILL MEET AGAIN
Eighty suffrage precinct workers in Omaha will meet at 3 p.m. Saturday at the Y.W.C.A. to receive their final campaign instructions before the election on November 3. These workers, under the direction of Misses Elsie Vandergrift and Jane Thomson have canvassed practically the entire city and have found that about seventy percent of the women want to vote.
The precinct women met yesterday when Mrs. Draper Smith, state suffrage president, paid tribute to Misses Thomson and Vandergrift.
Buffalo Courier, Buffalo, New York, 01 Nov 1914, Sun • Page 79
SUFFRAGE WORKER IS WILLING VICTIM OF CUPID'S DARTS
Miss Elsie Vandergrift of Local Speakers' Staff Is to Become the Bride of Ralph Benedict, Denver Newspaper Editor.
NEBRASKA CAMPAIGN TRIP BEGINNING OF HONEYMOON
Mrs. Carrie Chapmann Catt, Party to Happy Secret, Aids Plan by Offer of Leave of Absence After Election.
There's a pretty suffrage romance developing into a wedding today and Buffalo is the first to get the news of it. When Miss Elsie Vandergrift was ordered out of Buffalo on a few hours' notice and sent by Mrs. Carrie Chapman Catt, chairman of the state campaign committee, to Nebraska for the last month of the campaign there, Miss Vandergrift chuckled over her packing as she remarked, "Omaha's only fourteen hours ride from Denver."
And then Mrs. Catt's telegram explaining her loan to Nebraska was followed by a special delivery letter offering Miss Vandergrift a few weeks' leave to rest after the campaign, if she wanted to go back to Denver.
"New York needs me," was Miss Vandergrift's answer. "I'll come straight back here and I hope you'll let me stay in Buffalo."
Another Has Claim on Her.
But some one else had an opinion to offer on comparative needs and when Miss Vandergrift arrived in Omaha she found a long distance telephone call pursuing her into the small towns on the first days of her trip. Ralph Benedict, a newspaper editor of Denver, whose engagement to Miss Vandergrift was announced on the eve of her leaving for eighteen months' campaigning in this state, persuaded her to return and marry him at the conclusion of her Nebraska trip.
And so today Miss Vandergrift is slipping quietly into Denver--quietly because all of the western papers have been alert, seeking to know the exact moment of the ceremony, and Miss Vandergrift has subtly given all Nebraska to understand that even if she did finish her speaking in the campaign last evening, nothing would keep her from being right in Omaha to get the returns on Tuesday evening,.
Meanwhile trousseau getting has been sandwiched between street speeches and wedding plans have elbowed suffrage organization, and all arrangements are completed for today's ceremony.
Guest of Judge Lindsay.
Mr. Benedict is to meet his bride in the station at Denver, and they go directly to the home of their friend, Judge B. Lindsay. Judge Lindsay makes a special point of not performing marriage ceremonies, but in this instance he has specifically asked permission to officiate. Both Judge and Mrs. Lindsay have insisted that the ceremony is to be in their home, instead of at the judge's office, and, as Miss Vandergrift's mother is in California, the ceremony will take place as they wish, and will be followed by a wedding breakfast at their home.
These are the plans that Miss Vandergrift has written back to her friends here and she also says both her interest and that of Mr. Benedict is too closely involved in the suffrage cause to give it up. Mr. Benedict will do some lecture work later in the winter and after a two-month's honeymoon. Mrs. Benedict expects to return to New York to lecture for suffrage.
She is very hopeful of Nebraska carrying for the suffragists. The women have been having speakers and meetings and for years have been organized in suffrage clubs but they had never tried the house-to-house work with the voter and Miss Vandergrift has instituted the plans of the work as conducted her at the wish of Mrs. Catt.
"Shuleresque" Methods.
She writes to Mrs. Frank Shuler, leader of the eighth campaign district, "I have copied your methods, stolen bodily every shuleresque idea and used it here. Even the little handbills in yellow and black with which you placard a ward when you are having a street meeting there that night, have been pasted all over Nebraska. I have adopted your enrollment slips with their simple, "I believe in votes for women."
"Each day I take out ten women, the same ten if possible, to teach the local captains, which I secured at suffrage rallies during first three days in Omaha. We meet in the morning not later than 9 o'clock and give each pair a map of an election district and send them out to do the house-to-house canvass. We all come back at noon for luncheon, report and start out again, working until 6 o'clock. It is surprising how much territory two hustling women can cover, each taking one side of the street. What is left of the district is to be covered by the captain by the Thursday before election. You see it's much your plan and we do precisely as you do in Buffalo, wind up with a big street meeting in the central part of the ward that night, advertising it by leaving handbills at the house we are canvassing.
"They're all much interested in the wedding, for of course the announcement leaked out and before an hour had gone by the reporters were hot on my trail. In the house-to-house canvas the women mostly ask if it's the girl 'who's engaged to be married the day after election, who's going to speak.'
Meetings Are Successful.
"These meetings and in fact every phase of the squadron work has been a great success. The women here when once they are aroused are splendid workers. More than half of the men are signing and the work has gone well.
"I have noted one thing which strikes me as applying equally to New York. There is not so much opposition. It is simply that they have not heard anything on the subject. In fifty per cent of the cases, where they are first refuse to sign they end by saying, 'Of course, I believe in that.'"
From Miss Vandergrift's state of Colorado and from the other states where women vote will come the squadron of women voters en route to the big mass meeting in New York on Friday evening. Buffalo is to be the meeting place for them and at the big mass meeting tomorrow evening at 8 o'clock in Elmwood Music hall the women will make their first speeches in New York state. They've all played prominent parts in their own states and it will be interesting to see whether politics has changed them materially from the women here.
On Tuesday afternoon, Mrs. Dexter P. Rumsey, chairman of the local headquarters, will open her home in Delaware avenue to give the local suffrage workers a chance to meet the visitors. Plans for the meeting are being made by the eighth campaign district, Mrs. Frank J. Shuler, leader, from the local headquarters, Franklin and Huron streets.
The Buffalo Sunday Morning News, Buffalo, New York, 01 Nov 1914, Sun • Page 32
Today Miss Vandergrift and Mr. Benedict are to be married in Denver, according to plans written to friends here. Mrs. Catt loaned Ms. Vandergrift to Nebraska for a month's campaign and Omaha, being pretty close to Denver, long distance messages prevailed upon Miss Vandergrift to come to Denver and be married.
Judge Ben B. Lindsay, who ordinarily refuses to perform marriage ceremonies, has asked as a special favor that he may officiate and with Mrs. Lindsay insists, as Miss Vandergrift's mother is in California, upon the ceremony at their home this morning, followed by a wedding dinner.
Omaha World-Herald, Sunday, Dec 20, 1914
Mrs. Ralph Payne Benedict of Denver, formerly Miss Elsie Vandergrift, will be in the city on December 28. Mrs. Benedict, who was then Miss Elsie Vandergrift, was one of the workers sent here by the national society to help in the campaign for suffrage. Mrs. Benedict will probably be honor guest at a luncheon while here, to be given by the suffragists.
