Apr 16, 2019 - Sale 2505

Sale 2505 - Lot 233

Price Realized: $ 10,625
?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 3,000 - $ 4,000
(WOMEN.) Scrapbook compiled by suffragist Florence Harmon. 42 leaves, containing 15 photos, ephemera, typed letters, and many newspaper clippings; with numerous loose pieces laid in. Folio, 1/2 calf gilt, minor wear; light wear and soiling to contents, some leaves chipped. New York and other places, 1912-33

Additional Details

Scrapbook kept by Florence Mirels Harmon (circa 1888-after 1938), secretary to noted suffragist and socialite Alva Belmont. Belmont favored a more militant brand of suffrage, influenced by Emmeline Pankhurst. Harmon was involved with the Silent Sentinels protest in front of Wilson's White House and even tried to deliver a letter personally to Wilson as Belmont's representative. A photographic portrait of Belmont is present, along with letters from her and other ephemera related to the Political Equality Association she founded in New York.
Harmon has pasted newspaper clippings to many of the leaves, while still more are present laid in loosely. Most of these concern rallies or other suffrage issues, including one clipping which depicts Harmon standing atop a car speaking to a crowd. Among the 15 photographs, mostly of suffragettes or rally events, one rather large photo shows the interior of Alva Belmont's sumptuous drawing room, labeled, "Meeting at Mrs. Belmont's House, 51 St & Madison Ave, 1915". Also included in the scrapbook are signed letters from suffrage notables Katherine Sophie Dreier; Irene Corwin Davison; Maud Cabot; Inez Milholland (signed photo); Mary Ritter Beard; Blair Niles; Hazel MacKaye; Georgiana Howland; and several others. Most of the contents are dated from 1912 through 1917, with a few from her later life as Mrs. Florence Harmon Dock through 1933. A nice assemblage of suffragist ephemera and manuscripts, kept by one of their own.