HARBERT, Elizabeth Morrison Boynton
Elizabeth Morrison Boynton was born in Crawfordsville 15 April 1843 the daughter of William H. and Abigail Sweetser. She was better known as Lizzie and as a journalist, author and poet she went by Lizzie M. Boynton. She wrote the Golden Fleece, Out of Her Sphere and Amore as well as the editor (for almost a decade) of the Women’s Department of the Chicago Inter Ocean. (Encyclopedia of American Bio).
Quite a suffragist and club goer, the young lady graduated from Terre Haute Female College in 1862 and earned her PhD (quite a feat in that time frame) form Ohio Wesleyan. She gave her first lecture in her home town in 1869 and was close to non-stop lecturing thereafter. Marrying the next year to William S. Harbert (Oct 18) and they lived much of their lives in Chicago, where they raised their three children Arthur, Corrine and Boynton Elizabeth. Lizzie organized the Evanston, Illinois Woman’s Club and served as its president for the next seven years. Her list of organizations in lengthy but some of the more interesting ones were Association President of the World’s Unity League; VP of the Woman’s Civic League when they lived in Southern California; Associated Press; National Household Economic. Association. (Dillon, Mary Earhart Collection, Series II: Elizabeth Boynton Harbert). Lizzie published several books on women’s issues and suffrage, even when the subject was quite controversial (Activism at Ohio Wesleyan University Wikipedia). Seems she kind of liked to look at both sides as she organized the Pro & Con Club in Evanston in 1876 (evanstonwomen.org). Her article in the Inter Ocean in the 1880s was super. She was not afraid to tell her readers to get involved, learned all there was to learn about the candidates and discuss it with their husbands in civility! Besides her work as an activist, writer and such, she was very involved in the ME Church. One of her greatest accomplishments was “inducing the Republicans of Iowa to put to the state platform a woman’s plank.” Both Lizzie’s son and husband were lawyers. She had the three children and three grandchildren – bet she was an awesome gma’!