Me, as Dick Cheney
Activism is in my blood. Really. And
along the female line on my mother's side – the
Campbell/Schindlers. It began for me with feminism, but I was steeped
in that so early that I didn't even know to call it “activism.”
It was simply what I learned at my mother's knee.
My mother, Claire Schindler Collier, a born feminist
When the Feminist
Movement came along in the early 70's, I wondered what all the fuss
was about. Didn't everyone know that stuff? Of course, I had more to
learn, but youth often thinks it knows everything.
Julia and Ellen, more activists in the family
Last weekend The Sonoma County
Commission on the Status of Women held a public event for Women's
Equality Day. It was all about getting women to not only vote, but to
run for office. It was not very well-attended (what's new?) and there
were few men. Susan Chunco and I were tabling for the Green Party and
our female presidential candidate, Jill Stein. The Green Party has
run a woman for president in the last three elections!
Jill Stein for President, Green Party
The gathering gave me an opportunity to
share the activist/feminist history of my family. At some point
during the 1870's, my great-great-grandmother, Rachel Hutchinson
Campbell (born in Scotland) took two of her daughters to hear Henry
Ward Beecher. He was an abolitionist, who also supported women's
suffrage and temperance, as well as being the brother of Harriet
Beecher Stowe. Rachel was there because she was a supporter of the
temperance movement. It was primarily a women-led movement because
drunk men make very poor husbands!
Rachel Hutchinson Campbell
Her daughter, my great-grandmother
Isabelle, was so taken with Beecher's talk that she, along with her
sister, followed him back to his hotel and engaged him in
conversation for a couple of hours in the lobby. And thus, a
suffragist was born!
Saturday's event was the perfect
opportunity to pull out my blow-up of Isabelle Campbell Schindler
marching with other suffragists in Connecticut (photo undated). She
was the hit of the day. Many women had their pictures taken posing
with the suffragists – after all, Women's Equality Day was made
possible by their struggle. The Press Democrat sent
a reporter and he took our picture and that's what made it into the
Sunday paper to illustrate the event.
Here's the link to the article and photo:
http://www.pressdemocrat.com/news/6022707-181/santa-rosa-event-highlights-womens?artslide=1
You can tell from my blog and from my
Facebook page that I love to take photographs and have an immense
collection of my work. I come by it honestly because my family has a
huge collection of family photographs – more on my mother's side,
but plenty on both. The earliest portrait of my great-grandmother
Isabelle was taken during the Civil War. Her older (immigrant!)
brothers fought in the war. One of them earned the Medal of Honor for
action at the Battle of Vicksburg. (I have ancestors on both sides in
this war.)
Isabelle during the Civil War
Before marrying, Isabelle was a
teacher. She went on to become a speaker for the Suffrage Movement –
in addition to raising seven children (two others died in infancy)
all across the country because her Unitarian minister husband, John,
moved them a lot. She was a much loved mother judging by the writings
by her children that I have. They called her “Mumpsie.”
The only picture I have of her in her role as suffragist is the one I blew up and take with me to events. I also have the frayed remnants of a “Votes for Women” sash! Written on the back of the photo is:
Isabelle and John with all of their children
My grandfather, John, is the young boy in the middle
The only picture I have of her in her role as suffragist is the one I blew up and take with me to events. I also have the frayed remnants of a “Votes for Women” sash! Written on the back of the photo is:
Miss Fanny Lawson – a little NYC
girl, who is dubbed “The Little Mouse” but who does good
canvassing
Miss Hare – leader of the county and
principal of one of the Troy (NY) schools
Mrs. Elsie Benedict of Colorado, leader
of the squad she brought here
Mrs. Hovine, whose place I am to take
in this county
(Isabelle Schindler) It is “I”. Be
not afraid.
Miss Freeman, local worker
Mrs. May Belle Morgan, southern beauty
Miss Freeman, local worker
Two of her daughters, my great-aunts
Jessie and Helen never married and lived their lives outside the
norm. Both worked – Jessie taught English and I have her editions
of Shakespeare's plays (with margin notes) and Helen did a number of
things, including working as a “spy” for her father and brothers'
detective agency.
After my great-grandmother died in
1929, my great-grandfather, John Franklin Schindler, went on to fight
to abolish the death penalty; just one of the causes he worked on. He
traveled extensively speaking and writing.
In the early 1930's, a
letter of his was published in The New York Times
predicting that, if allowed to carry guns, sheriff's deputies would
end up killing innocent people. Little did he know! As part of that
work, he and his sons developed a lie detector.
John F. Schindler on the right, sons Raymond in middle and Walter on left
One of his sons, my
great-uncle Raymond Schindler,
was
one of the founders and a member of the Court of Last Resort, which
helped in the administration of justice in cases of persons who have
exhausted the ordinary legal remedies in efforts to prove themselves
innocent of crimes. He also appeared in a 1950's television show of
the same name. It had a short run, but we always watched it.
Great-uncle Raymond C. Schindler, standing, white hair
Okay,
I guess I'm going to have to acknowledge that there's some activism
on the male side, as well!
In a future post
I'll elaborate on my mother. For now, no poem, no recipe, instead excerpts from Isabelle Campbell Schindler's obituary and eulogy. You'll see why I'm
proud to claim her as family.
Mumpsie
Isabelle Campbell Schindler was born
in New Philadelphia, Ohio, on January 31st,
1858; she was 71 years of age. Her parents, James Campbell and Rachel
Hutchinson, came to the United States from Ayr, Scotland about 1850
[1848], and located in Ohio.
Belle Campbell, as she was
affectionately known to her schoolmates and friends, graduated from
the New Philadelphia High School, then took a two year's course in
Worthington College, Worthington, Ohio, preparing herself to teach
school. She taught school for nearly four years.
On February 21st,
1880, Mr. and Mrs. Schindler were married in New Comerstown [I have
the wedding announcement that appeared in the local paper], Ohio,
where Mrs. Schindler was then a teacher in the village schools. Mr.
Schindler was at the time a freshman in St.Lawrence University,
Canton, New York. Mrs. Schindler joined her husband when he began his
junior year, and took post-graduate work in the second oldest
co-educational college in the United States, admitting women to all
the privileges accorded to men.
Mr. and Mrs. Schindler have reared a
family of seven children, six of whom survive the mother. She was
from the days of their birth to the day of her passing, their most
beloved and precious possession. Her understanding mind and devoted
companionship won their continuing affection. Mother was always first
in the Schindler household, and in the mind of every member of the
family.
From early girlhood to the day she
was last taken ill, Mrs. Schindler was always interested in some dort
of work for the relief, or assistance, of others outside of her own
family. Her mother was a leader in the Militant temperance crusade in
Ohio over fifty years ago; and the daughter became a worthy successor
as a leader in the work of the Woman's Christian Temperance Union.
In 1884, at a meeting in
Marshalltown, Iowa, called to consider the claims of Cremation as a
method of disposing of the dead, Mrs. Schindler and two liberal
ministers spoke in favor of the startling and altogether unpopular
proposal. She was advanced in her thinking, conservative in
statement, considerate of differing opinion, and had the full courage
of her convictions [she was cremated].
Early in her life Mrs. Schindler
became a believer in and advocate of Woman's Suffrage. Before she was
20 years of age she, with one of her sisters, heard Henry Ward
Beecher advocate of what was then called Women's Rights. The two
girls called on Mr. Beecher at his hotel and asked him questions
regarding the then new and strange doctrine.
Later on, when a resident of New
York City, Mrs. Schindler became a leader and public speaker, under
the direction of Carrie Chapman Catt, in the strenuous and finally
successful Woman's Suffrage Campaign. One of her notable achievements
was a tour she made as speaker to open air meetings in the final
suffrage campaign in Ohio. In that campaign she spoke from the same
platform with Richmond Pearson Hobson, and acquitted herself with
credit to her cause and to herself.
(This eulogy from
Dr. Frederick W. Roman, lecturer and writer.)
My friends, we are met to do homage
and pay our last respects to our departed friend. Her life as a
record of exalted devotion and consecration to the great duties of
home and citizenship. Her example will be to all of us a lasting
memory, a challenge and call t the highest potentialities of our
lives. We will miss her in our intimate circles. She leaves vacant a
position in our minds and hearts that cannot be filled. There will be
left, however, the rich and cherished memory of one who knew the art
of being loyal; who took joy in the service of things worthwhile; who
was solicitous for the welfare of all who had the privilege of
crossing her life's pathway.
It was my good fortune to pass many
delightful hours with Mrs. Schindler. For the last several years we
have been in the closest cooperation in talking of the needs of our
immediate society and the world at large. During these contacts I was
made to realize what a busy life she had always led. She was deeply
interested in the homes of our country. She was a sympathetic and
understanding friend to ambitious boys and girls. She was ever
solicitous of discovering new modes of thought and action that would
lead to enriched forms of behavior and more responsible attitudes.
She had an alert mind. Its
capacities and potentialities passed the circle of her immediate
environment. It led to her entrance into various reform movements,
and finally it accounts for the progressive role she was already
playing here in the city of Los Angeles; and we who are members of
the “Parliament of Man” will always be cognizant of the loss of
one who was to us an ever ready challenge to the highest that in
nature we could be.
Mrs. Schindler was a woman who read
widely. She had clear conceptions of the capacity of men who hold
responsible positions. She had a comprehensive grasp of the great
political and economic questions of our time. She was always actuated
by wise and firm decisions, moderated by tolerance, and ever ready to
change a point of view in the light of new findings. She was a woman
who never grew old.......
The sum total of her sympathies
makes us feel our loss at this hour all the more. She has left us a
life that will be regarded as a rich heritage. In this age of social
disorder her life will be looked upon as one of those rare human
values that become the stabilizer of the best forms of human conduct.
She was a model to all mothers. Her resplendent attitudes toward
life, and her continues striving toward the larger responsibility of
both the home and the State make her forever an outstanding example
to all women.
Our friend shared the common thought
of the large majority of thoughtful men and women in the belief of
some sort of immortality. She was not disposed to talk much on these
matters because her life was spent at all times in a rich measure of
service to others. She was winning immortality, not by remembering
herself, but by a constant forgetting in a devotion to something that
was larger than mere existence. She was engaged in evolving
conceptions of truth that can never die. She was absorbed in the
formulation of newer and richer life processes that would be
calculated to reduce social waste, and that in the end would result
in newer and better conceptions of living. This is itself would
accelerate the growth and extension of a permanent civilization.....
Hi there, regarding your uncle, Raymond C. Schindler. Is he the one who lived in the Spratt Mansion in Tarrytown? I am a fan of the TV show Dark Shadows and his old house was used for exterior shots as "the old house." I have been searching for years for any shots from the interior of that house, they are extremely rare to run across. Is there any possibility that anyone in the family might have any to share? My regular email address is fantasyva@aol.com I appreciate your time and any consideration. Mitch Kirsner
ReplyDeleteSorry to be so slow on this. Yes, the same Schindler. I do not have any interior shots of the house. I'll ask my cousins, but we've been sharing lots of old photos - nothing inside. I'd love to see some. I remember, as a child, how huge it seemed with a curved banister in the main hall - we did lots of playing on those stairs. My other principle memory is of huge beds and lots of animal skin rugs from Uncle Raymond's hunting.
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