Mrs. James Lee Laidlaw

An Edison Kinetophone short featuring leading suffragists Harriet May Mills, Mrs. James Lees Laidlaw, Mrs. Raymond Brown, Mrs. John Rogers, Jr., and Elizabeth Freeman delivering speeches in support of women’s right to vote. Produced as part of Edison’s early sound-film experiments, it captured real voices from the suffrage movement and was exhibited in vaudeville houses, where it sometimes met with controversy. (Note: This film is distinct from the 1912 Reliance production of the same name directed by Hal Reid, which was a silent dramatic narrative.)

Film is the opening of the second New York State suffrage campaign on Sept. 8, 1917 at Sagamore Hill. The first campaign, beginning in 1913, was unsuccessful; the woman suffrage amendment was rejected by the voters in 1915. On Nov. 6, 1917, the suffrage amendment to the New York State Constitution was approved by the voters. The suffragists invited to Sagamore Hill were headed by Mrs. Norman deR. Whitehouse, State Chairman of the New York State Woman Suffrage Party. Sequence of TR talking to three women: the woman in the dark hat and coat is Mrs. Ogden Mills Reid; the woman dressed in furs next to TR is Mrs. Whitehouse; and the tall woman in the light hat and jacket is Mrs. James Lees Laidlaw.