AMERICAN WOMAN'S LEAGUE

american woman's league spoon

Rare Art Deco sterling spoon featuring the first  assembly of suffragettes for the American Woman's League.

In 1910, a meeting of about 1000 suffragettes was sponsored by  the magazine publisher Edward Gardner Lewis.
The nice  Art Academy building at the University of Washington School of Fine Art is now called the Lewis Center and has a historical pottery display.

The plan for the new League was to create educational and business opportunities for its woman members.

The league grew rapidly to 100,000 members and sponsored 50,000 correspondence students.
38 chapter houses were established around the country (it is possible that spoons for some of these local groups may exist, but I have never seen one.)

Eventually the Lewis business empire collapsed and funding for the league was discontinued.

Apparently in November of 1968, the renown spoon researcher, Donna Felger, wrote an article about this spoon.
Briefly summarizing her article with some different facts.
1. The spoon she described was silver plated and made by Wallace. (This spoon is sterling --so it was likely made in both metals)
2. University City is a suburb of St. Louis, Missouri
3. Mr. Lewis was the publisher of a magazine called: "The Woman's Magazine" for which he charged ten cents per year.
4. He supposedly had the largest subscription list of any publication in the world at that time.
5. He was a sponsor  of the 1904 Worlds Fair in St. Louis, 1904
6. The building pictured on the spoon opened in the fall of 1909.
7. Postal  authorities accused Mr. Lewis of mail fraud and indicted him in 1911.
8. The Art Institute closed in 1911, which indicates this spoon was made between 1909 and 1911.
9. The Art Academy is pictured in the bowl where the pottery was made.  At the top is the dome of city hall above the Egyptian Temple.
The circular medallion is a statue of a woman with children which was the symbol of the League. (from an article by Paul Evans in December, 1971)

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