The Artifacts of Carrie (“Carry”) Nation

Born in June of 1846 in Kentucky, Carry Nation, shown here, was woman who stood six feet tall and weighed in at 175 pounds. A fervent member of the Temperance Movement, in 1900 she heard a “Voice from Above” that told her to take something hard in her hands and go wreck saloons. Her first adventure was in Kiowa, Kansas, where she stormed into a barroom and proceeded to heave rocks.  So far as I know, none of her rocks have been collected.  Other Carry Nation artifacts, however, are collected, as documented here.

Recognizing that once a rock is thrown through a saloon mirror, it loses its usefulness as a weapon, Carry soon switched to an implement known as a Crandall hammer, normally used by masons to dress building stone.  When that proved inadequate to her purposes of smashing barrooms, she moved to — and stayed with — the hatchet. In time she owned three, naming them “Faith,” “Hope,” and “Charity.”

This axe became an enduring symbol as Carry performed her “hachetations” in saloons across the country.  Invited into speak in his Guthrie, Oklahoma saloon by Moses Weinberger following her pledge not to do any hatchet swinging, Carry reneged and chopped a chunk from his mahogany bar.  This was only one of dozens of bars bearing the scars of her fury.

Early on she began to need funds for her living expenses and to pay jail fines, railroad fares and hotel bills.  According to the Kansas Historical Society, while she was speaking to an assembly on a Topeka street in 1901, a man handed her some small pewter hatchets. He suggested, "Sell them to this crowd and you can pay your costs and fines this month." The listeners quickly snatched them up. 

 After that the zealot in a bonnet was never without a bag full of them to sell, stored in a bag slung over her shoulder.  In her autobiography, “The Use and Need of the Life of Carry A. Nation,” she said of the pins, "They carry a message with them, it is the heart of a mother crying, "Carry A. Nation for my baby, for my loved ones, Carry A. Nation against the saloons.”   Women all over America who supported Prohibition wore them with pride.

Other hatchets with her message were contributed by adherents.  Shown here is a tiny medal item that bears a presumed likeness of Carry on the blade.  Dated 1901 and reading “Axe of All Nations,” the handle implored  “Cut Out the Whiskey.”  Meant as a watch fob or for a keychain, this hatchet was the handiwork of a friendly Michigan stove manufacturer. 

The origins and use of another, painted hatchet remains a mystery.  The slogan “All Nations Welcome But Carrie,” was used against the lady but she cannily adopted it as her own mantra to disparage the saloonkeepers who shut the door on her.  As shown here by the “Down with Rum” plaque, the hatchet became a symbol for the entire Temperance Movement.

“The badge of our army,” Carrie declared widely of her “Home Defender” pinbacks.  Historians note that the concept of women as Home Defenders was central to the prohibition movement. Women were seen as protecting the home from the ravages of alcohol and other vices. Nation herself donated one of these buttons to the Kansas Historical Society in 1901.  The Home Defender carafe shown here obviously held nothing stronger than sweet tea.

Photographs of Nation abound.  Those she also sold.  In her autobiography she declared:  “I never want to picture taken of myself without my Bible, my constant and heavenly companion.”  The hatchet was a second “constant companion,” abeit somwhat less heavenly.   My favorite photo, below, is of Carrie talking to two men on the street.  Her hands hold neither Bible nor axe, but are extended as if in supplication — a humanizing and sympathetic pose unlike the others.

Other Nation memorabilia are the many cartoons that were inked about her during her rampage and even afterward.  The one at right was contemporary with her crusade.  The one at left, by Theodore Geisel (Dr. Seuss) was aimed at latter day prohibitionary efforts.  

The last artifact is a ceramic figural made by Schafer & Vader, a German pottery that made mini-flasks call “nips” for both European and American liquor outfits.  I date this statuette from the early 1900s.  It is not clear whether it is meant to represented Nation herself or one of her acolytes. The woman is carrying a Bible, but no hatchet, and wears a large cross around her neck, something I have not seen on Carry.  In either case the object is satirical.  Schafer & Vader had a lot to lose if America went dry.  And did when it did.

Note:  Kansas, a state in which Carry Nation spent much of her life, through its Museum of History in Topeka has preserved a considerable amount of material about her.  Several of the photos used here are from the Museum’s online exhibit that features posts on various aspects of the hatchet-swinger’s life, including a quiz.  The contact: kshs.kansasmuseum@ks.gov.

The Frightful Face of Prohibition

In Hillsboro, a Southwestern Ohio farming town, just before Christmas 1873, 70 women left the Presbyterian Church and marched downtown to saloons and drugstores that sold liquor. They prayed on the sawdust floor or, if barred from entering, outside on the snowy ground. The effects were startling. Owners were seen pouring booze into the gutters. That day, the Women’s Christian Temperance Union (WCTU) was born.

Within 50 days the WCTU Crusade, according to their publicist, “drove the liquor traffic, horse, foot and dragoons, out of 250 towns and villages.” It took another 47 years for liquor to be made illegal throughout the Nation -- a significant victory for the WCTU. As shown here in a cartoon, adherents felt like Joan of Arc, coming to the rescue of the country with battle ax in hand, fighting “Womans Holy War.”

For many males of a drinking persuasion, however, the efforts of Temperance women were depicted less heroically. Another cartoon , entitled “The Struggle,” shows a man being pulled on one side by a comely woman through a fancy archway and tugged on the other by a spinsterish woman in a funny hat. She is urging him toward a wooden shack on which is written, “Abandon Joy All Ye Who Enter Here.” It leaves little doubt which way the gent will be heading.

The public face of the WCTU did little to discourage this sexist view of prohibition. Francis Elizabeth Willard, the president of a women’s college in Evanston, Illinois, left academia in 1879 to become the president of the WCTU. Shown here, her stern visage appeared frequently in the pages of newspapers nationwide as she campaigned vigorously against strong drink.

Willard’s image helped give rise to a series of cartoons and photo mocking the WCTU mantra, “Lips that Touch Liquor Shall Never Touch Mine.” These images often sarcastically juxtaposed the motto with pictures of women who looked as if they had never been in danger of being kissed by drinkers, teetotalers, or anyone else.

When Carry Nation burst upon the scene in 1900, she reinforced male stereotypes about the kind of women carrying the torch for Prohibition (see my posting May 2009). Like Joan of Arc, she brandished a weapon, in this case a hatchet, and traveled the country storming and wrecking barrooms. A series of postcards from that era parodied her actions as those of the “Saloon Smasher.” So identified did Ms. Nation become with the Temperance Movement that the venerable Dr. Seuss himself ridiculed her in 1942, long after her death, in a cartoon satirizing efforts to reestablish the Anti-Drink Crusade.

There is more than immediately meets the eye in this effort to depict anti-alcohol females as unattractive and sometimes violent hags. The WCTU preceded by almost a half century women being given the vote in the United States. Upon taking the reins of the WCTU, Francis Willard had added the cause of Women’s Suffrage to the organization agenda. If females in advocacy roles could be portrayed as highly offensive, some opponents reasoned the images also would discourage efforts at giving women the vote. In the end, Prohibition failed and was repealed. Women, on the other hand, were enfranchised in 1920 -- and the rest is history.

Carry Nation and Teddy Roosevelt’s Bottle

.

Born in June of 1846 in Kentucky, Carry Nation, shown here, was woman who stood six feet tall and weighed in at 175 pounds. A fervent member of the Temperance Movement, in 1900 she heard a “Voice from Above” that told her to take something hard in her hands and go wreck saloons. Her first adventure was in Kiowa, Kansas, where she stormed into a barroom and proceeded to heave rocks. Soon she had graduated to a hatchet as her weapon of choice and continued her attack on saloons. Although arrested some 30 times and spending many nights in jail, she became a national heroine of the Prohibitionist movement.

In 1904 she decided it was time to take her message and hatchet to Washington, D.C. With plenty of reporters in her wake, this formidable matron marched straight up to the White House. According to contemporary reports, The guard was polite but firm. He met Mrs. Nation before she got to the door to inform her it was not possible to see the President Theodore Roosevelt. When she began a harangue, the guard broke in. “Madam,” he said, “do not make a lecture here.” She left shouting : “I suppose you have the same motto here in the White House that they have in the saloons, ‘All the Nations Welcome Except Carry.’ ”

Carry was not so easily dissuaded from seeing the President. She soon headed back to the White House, again trailed by followers and the press. Aware of her presence, this time Teddy Roosevelt sent out his personal secretary, William Loeb Jr., to confront her. In her autobiography, she described her very short conversation with Loeb: Mr. Loeb called to a police to take me out. I said: "If I was a brewer or distiller I could have an interview....Why has he [Roosevelt] never said a word against the licensed saloon when it is the greatest question that ever confronted the homes of America?" That question was left unanswered and she was ejected.

She subsequently lectured in Washington brandishing a bottle that carried a likeness of Roosevelt. “Here is a whiskey flask with Theodore Roosevelt’s picture on it, the most appropriate place I have ever seen it in my life,” said she. Later Carry admitted that after her first use of the bottle she expected hisses but got only nervous giggles. That tepid reaction emboldened her to use the prop again and again. This historical incident has peaked my interest intensely about what bottled likeness of Teddy she used. Here is what my research has disclosed:

Roosevelt, shown here in a photograph, had appeared on a campaign flask in the 1900 campaign with William McKinley, who later was assassinated which propelled him into the White House. Teddy also was depicted in figural bottles, shown here, in his role as a Rough Rider and a big game hunter. But none of these bottles seem to fit the bill. My guess is that the flask that Carry Nation brandished was the one pictured here, issued in 1904 when Roosevelt ran on his own for President. It fits the description -- but there may have been others. Only Carry would know for sure.