Lucy Stone

In the rotunda of the nation's Capital a statue pays homage to three famous nineteenth-century American women suffragists: Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Lucretia Mott. "Historically," the inscription beneath the marble statue notes, "these three stand unique and peerless." In fact, the statue has a glaring omission: Lucy Stone. A pivotal leader in the fight for both abolition and gender equality, her achievements marked the beginning of the women's rights movement and helped to lay the groundwork for the eventual winning of women's suffrage. Sally McMillen sets out to address this significant historical oversight. Stone graduated in 1847 from the Oberlin Collegiate Institute as one of the first women in the US to earn a college degree and was immediately drawn into the public sector as an activist and orator. Lecturing on anti-slavery and women's rights, she played a critical role in the organization and leadership of the American Equal Rights Association during the Civil War, and, in 1869, cofounded the American Woman Suffrage Association.

Sally G. McMillen is the Mary Reynolds Babcock Professor of History at Davidson College. Her books include Seneca Falls and the Origins of the Women's Rights Movement, Motherhood in the Old South: Pregnancy, Childbirth, and Infant Rearing, and To Raise Up the South.