Biographical Database of NAWSA Suffragists, 1890-1920
Biography of Nancy Courtney Taylor, 1860-1936
By Mona Reno, Nevada Women's History Project
President Churchill County Equal Suffrage League, 1913; Vice-President of the Nevada Equal Franchise Society for Churchill County, 1914
Nancy Alice Courtney was born on January 30, 1860, to Jesse A. Courtney and Mary Emmeline Pile Courtney, in Ottawa, Kansas. Nancy married Henry Clay Taylor on December 31, 1882, in Jarbalo, Kansas. The couple had seven children between 1883 and 1904, of which five grew to adulthood. By 1888, the family was living California, where they moved several times until moving to Nevada between 1909 and 1910. They lived in Churchill County for over 20 years and then moved back to California by 1930.
During her years in Nevada, Nancy Taylor became active in the work for women's right to vote. In 1913, she was elected the president of the Churchill County Equal Suffrage League. Then in 1914, she was elected to be thirteenth vice-president of the statewide Nevada Equal Franchise Society. She drove from her ranch in Churchill County to Fallon for suffrage meetings.
Following Nevada's successful suffrage campaign, the Nevada Equal Franchise Society was dissolved and then reformed as the Nevada Women's Civic League. In 1915, Nancy Taylor was elected thirteenth vice-president of this new organization for Churchill County.
Nancy and Henry Taylor were married over 50 years until her death on November 8, 1936, in Clay, California, at age 76. Henry Taylor died July 27, 1951, in Lodi, California. They were buried in the Galt Cemetery in Sacramento County.
CAPTION: Nancy Taylor (Mrs. H.C.), Fallon, Nevada, ca. 1914.
CREDIT: Sara Bard Field, “Clash in Nevada: A History of Woman's Fight for Enfranchisement, the Nevada Suffrage Fight,” Out West: A Magazine of the Old Pacific and the New. August 1914, p. 58. HathiTrust
Sources:
Field, Sara Bard. “Clash in Nevada: A History of Woman's Fight for Enfranchisement, the Nevada Suffrage Fight.” Out West: A Magazine of the Old Pacific and the New. August 1914, pp. 51-66. HathiTrust
Find a Grave. Nancy Alice Courtney Taylor. Accessed April 5, 2019. https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/73459664/nancy-alice-taylor.
Harper, Ida Husted, ed. “Nevada.” Chapter XXVII in History of Woman Suffrage, vol. 6: 1900-1920. New York: National American Woman Suffrage Association, 1922, 394-409. [LINK]
Harker Family Tree on Ancestry.com
“Miss Martin Remains as Suffrage Leader.” Nevada State Journal (Reno, Nev.). February 25, 1914, p.8. Newspapers.com.
United States Census 1870, 1880, s.v. “Nancy Courtney, Tonganoxie, Kan.” HeritageQuest.
United States Census 1910, 1920, s.v. “Nancy Taylor, Churchill, Nev.” HeritageQuest.
United States Census 1930, s.v. “Nancy Taylor, Sacramento, Calif.” HeritageQuest.
“Women's Club Elects Its Officers.” Reno Evening Gazette (Reno, Nev.). February 19, 1915, pp.1-2. Newspapers.com.