Biographical Database of NAWSA Suffragists, 1890-1920
Biography of Henrietta Baldy Lyon, 1865-1960
By Michelle Furlano, independent historian
Henrietta Baldy was born on April 14, 1865 in Danville, PA, to Henry Hurley Baldy and Henrietta Cooper Montgomery Baldy. Baldy's mother died when she was an infant, and Baldy was sent to Williamsport, Pennsylvania, where she was raised by her great-aunt Caroline and her husband Edward Lyon. Baldy eventually adopted the Lyon name to honor them.
Baldy Lyon attended private schools in Williamsport and studied at Elmira College in Elmira, New York. Baldy became involved in many social and activist organizations after graduating. She was a member of the Pennsylvania Society of the Colonial Dames of America, the Pennsylvania Daughters of the American Revolution, the Philadelphia College Club, the Women's Club, the Clio Club, and the YWCA. During World War I she served as the Lycoming County Chair of the Women's Liberty Loan Committee and helped organize the Lycoming chapter of the American Red Cross, the Lycoming County Speakers Bureau, and the Lycoming County Food Committee.
In September 1915, Baldy Lyon was elected chair of the Lycoming County Suffrage Party. She spoke at the forty-eighth annual convention of the Pennsylvania Woman Suffrage Association, hosted in Williamsport, Lycoming County, in November 1916.
After the Nineteenth Amendment was ratified, Baldy Lyon served on the state executive board of the League of Women Voters. She also served as an officer of the local League of Women Voters, educating women on political participation.
While she never married, she was aunt to numerous nephews and nieces. She died on January 11, 1950 in Williamsport, PA.
Sources
Sieminski, Mary "Henrietta Baldy Lyon: Our own suffragist." Williamsport Sun-Gazette (Williamsport, PA), Apr.13, 2014. Accessed online: http://www.lycoming.edu/orgs/lcwhc/PDFs/Lyon_Henrietta.pdf
"Miss Henrietta Baldy Lyon, Early Woman Suffrage Leader in County, Dies at Her Home." Williamsport Sun (Williamsport, PA), Jan. 12, 1950. From James V. Brown Library, Collection: Williamsport Women: Words, Images, Actions: 1875-1925. Part of Lycoming College Women's History Collection. http://www.lycoming.edu/library/lcwhc.html
"Miss Lyon is elected Chairman of Lycoming County suffragist" Gazette & Bulletin (Williamsport, PA), Feb. 25, 1918. From James V. Brown Library, Collection: Williamsport Women: Words, Images, Actions: 1875-1925. Part of Lycoming College Women's History Collection. http://www.lycoming.edu/library/lcwhc.html.
Walworth, Ellen Hardin, ed., Daughters of the American Revolution Magazine Vol. III. Washington, D.C.: National Society, 1893.
"Henrietta Baldy Lyon," Find a grave. Accessed online: http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=95674563