Biographical Database of NAWSA Suffragists, 1890-1920
Biography of Alma Arabella Parker (Mrs. George) Harvey, 1862-1931
By Chloe Belle Hooton, student, Harvard College, Cambridge, Massachusetts.
Co-founder and vice-president, Deal, New Jersey, Equal Franchise Society of New Jersey; National Committee, Women's Section of the Navy League
Alma Arabella Parker was born in 1862 in Peacham, Vermont to Dr. Luther F. Parker and Louisa Parker (née Louisa Martin). She went to Peacham Academy, as did her husband, Colonel George Brinton McClellan Harvey. They were married in October of 1887. They had one adopted child, Dorothy Harvey (Mrs. Augustus Cobb). Through her travels with her husband during his tenure as a foreign diplomat, she became fluent in many languages and made many friends abroad whom she kept up with throughout her life. She died after her husband in September of 1931. She was buried in the same county as her birth and death, Cadelonia County, Vermont.
Alma Harvey helped found the Equal Franchise Society of New Jersey. As the delegate from Deal, she was one of the vice-presidents along with Mrs. Caroline B. Alexander, Mrs. Everett Colby, and Miss Alice Lakey. The president was Mrs. Thomas S. Henry of Jersey City. The Equal Franchise Society of New Jersey emerged in 1910, pulling in the high society liberal women to join. While New Jersey was originally the only colony to permit women to vote, after they took the vote away in 1807, on August 26, 1920, they became the last state to guarantee women full suffrage.
The Equal Franchise Society started in 1908 to "promote the welfare of women, to secure the National, State, and local franchise for women." They were part of the 1912 women's march up 5th Avenue in New York City to support the suffrage movement. Alma's husband, George, was on the board of the New York City chapter. He used his position as editor of Harper's Weekly and the North American Review to promote the suffrage movement, publicly stating "Woman Suffrage is a necessity."
By 1915, Mrs. Harvey was also on the National Committee of the Women's Selection of the Navy League, one of the two female organizations at the time for National Defense. They supported female involvement in the war through stateside preparedness. During the war, they supported the troops through various methods back home; they created emergency hospitals in their summer homes and provided specimen kits for both the regular and volunteer armies.
Sources:
"Alma Arabella Parker Harvey (1862-1931) - Find A Grave Memorial." Alma Arabella Parker Harvey (1862-1931) - Find A Grave Memorial. N.p., n.d. Web. 21 Mar. 2017. https://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=40708137.
Anna Fitzhugh Miller Introducing Maud Nathan, president of the National Consumers' League, speaking on working women at GPEC meeting - Miller NAWSA Suffrage Scrapbooks, 1897-1911. Accessed online at http://memory.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/h?ammem/rbcmillerbib:@field(DOCID+@lit(rbcmiller001296))
"MRS. GEORGE HARVEY DIES IN VERMONT." New York Times, Sept. 06, 1931. http://search.proquest.com.ezp-prod1.hul.harvard.edu/docview/99292200?accountid=11311
Scannell, John James. Scannell's New Jersey's First Citizens and State Guide: Biographies of the Notable Living Men and Women of New Jersey, the State's History, Affairs, Officialism and Institutions. Place of Publication Not Identified: Patrick Scannell, 1919.
Second Annual Convention of the Women's Suffrage Party - Miller NAWSA Suffrage Scrapbooks, 1897-1911 http://hdl.loc.gov/loc.rbc/rbcmil.scrp7008301.
Stanton, Elizabeth Cady, Susan B. Anthony, and Mathilda Joslyn Gage, eds.. History of Woman Suffrage. 1900-1920, vol. 6. New York: Arno, 1969. LINK
"Suffrage Buttons." Woman Suffrage Memorabilia. Woman Suffrage Memorabilia, 5 Oct. 2012. Web. 20 Mar. 2017. Accessed online at http://womansuffragememorabilia.com/woman-suffrage- memorabilia/suffrage-buttons/
The Encyclopedia of New Jersey. St. Clair Shores, MI: Somerset, 1999.
Wilson, Richard Guy. Harbor Hill: Portrait of a House. New York, NY: Norton, 2008.
"WOMEN FOR PREPAREDNESS." THE SUMMIT HERALD, 27 Aug. 1915: n. pag.