08/26/2026
Today is
On March 25, 2022, three historic markers were unveiled in Cincinnati as part of the National Votes for Women Trail, sponsored by the National Collaborative for Women’s History Sites and the William G. Pomeroy Foundation.
These markers are dedicated to suffragists with connections to Cincinnati, including local artist and Art Academy of Cincinnati alum Cornelia Cassady Davis (1868–1920). Noting her efforts on the road to the 19th Amendment, Davis’s marker can be seen by visitors at the top of the Elsinore steps off Eden Park Drive near the museum.
Her poster, “Let Ohio Women Vote,” became an icon of Ohio’s suffrage campaign after it won first prize in a competition sponsored by the Cincinnati Woman Suffrage Party in 1912. By this time, Davis was a respected, widely exhibited painter and prominent member of the local arts community. Around 1913 Davis became the first woman to be admitted to the life class of the all-male Cincinnati Art Club. It was another 65 years before the club began accepting women members as a matter of course.
Other markers were placed near Fifth Third’s headquarters on Fountain Square and in Walnut Hills, one block south of the Harriet Beecher Stowe House. Those markers represent Lucy Stone and husband, Henry Blackwell, who were prominent women’s rights and anti-slavery speakers; and Margaret Longley and husband, Elias, who advocated for abolition, equal rights and women’s suffrage through speaking appearances; their newspaper, Type of the Time; and their magazine, The Phonetic Magazine.
The trail seeks to recognize and celebrate the enormous diversity of people and groups active in the struggle for women’s suffrage. The trail consists of two parts: a database with a digital map and a program of historic markers for about 200 women’s suffrage sites across the country.
Image 1: Postcard reproducing Cornelia Cassady Davis’ "Let Ohio Women Vote" poster (courtesy of OHIO History Connection)
Image 2: Cornelia Cassady Davis with the Cincinnati Art Club’s life class, led by Frank Duveneck, May 1913 (from the Mary R. Schiff Library & Archives, Cincinnati Art Museum)
Image 3: Cornelia Cassady Davis’ National Votes for Women Trail marker in Eden Park
