|
Mary Gordon Ellis (April 21, 1889 – September 9, 1934) was an educator and politician from South Carolina. She became the first woman elected to the South Carolina Legislature with her election to the South Carolina State Senate in 1928. ==Life== Mary Gordon was born to Alexander M. Gordon and Mary Gamble Gordon, Sr. in the small community of Gourdin, near Kingstree; of Scotch-Irish descent, she was one of ten children.〔(【引用サイトリンク】title=Women Wielding Power-South Carolina )〕 When she was small, the family moved into Kingstree, where she grew up,〔 graduating from Kingstree High School in 1909. Already as a child she evinced an interest in politics, hanging around the steps of the county courthouse while listening to legal discussions, and sometimes sneaking inside to watch the court proeedings.〔 Upon graduating from high school Ellis taught locally for one year before heading to Winthrop College in Rock Hill for further study. There she graduated in 1913 after working part-time to pay for her education,〔 which was also funded with scholarship money;〔(【引用サイトリンク】title=The Index-Journal from Greenwood, South Carolina · Page 20 )〕 she had taken a sabbatical due to poor health in 1912, during which she had continued to teach.〔 She then moved south to Jasper County, near the border with Georgia, to serve as teacher and principal at a school in the town of Gillisonville;〔 she was the only female college graduate in the county,〔 and the first teacher there with a college degree.〔 In 1914 Ellis married Junius Gather Ellis, a farmer and turpentine operator who was relatively affluent for the area; with him she would have three children, Mary Elizabeth, Margaret Lee, and Junius Gather.〔 The family lived at Ellis's home, Stockholm, located between Gillisonville and Coosawhatchie.〔 She continued to teach, unusual for a married woman at the time; she and her husband hired a tutor to help educate their children so that she could work. She also assisted in running her husband's businesses.〔 So alarmed were the couple at the poor state of local schools that when their eldest child was ready to begin her formal education, they sent her to live with relatives in Savannah to take advantage of the better schools there; her siblings soon followed.〔 Ellis further invited her sisters, students at Winthrop, to come and live with her during the summer and tutor local students to improve their education. One of their pupils went on to run the theological program at Duke University, while another took a high position at Clemson University.〔 To combat educational deficiencies in Jasper County, Ellis determined in 1924 to run for the position of county superintendent of schools. Many thought she was joking. Women were still rarities in elected office in South Carolina, and it was only two years since Kate Vixon Wofford had taken office as the first woman elected to public office in the state, when she became county superintendent of schools in Laurens County. Some of her acquaintance asked Ellis why she would want to head the county's education programs when her own children were being educated elsewhere; she replied, speaking of local schools, "If they are not good enough for my children, they are not good enough for yours." 〔 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Mary Gordon Ellis」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
|