Biographical Database of NAWSA Suffragists, 1890-1920
Biography of Elizabeth Pearl Allen Ames, 1874-1947
By Cindy Ingold, Gender Studies and Multicultural Services Librarian, University of Illinois, Urbana, Illinois.
Elizabeth Pearl Allen was born on September 13, 1874 in Macon, Mississippi to Benjamin Jackoway Allen and Jemima Emma Meador. In 1894, she married Charles Bismark Ames, an attorney and banker, who was also from Macon. Elizabeth and Charles moved to Oklahoma City, Oklahoma in 1899. They had five children: Ben Allen Ames, (b. 1894); Elizabeth Longstreet Ames (b. 1896); Charles Bismark Ames (b. 1900); Fisher Ames (b. 1905); and Longstreet Ames (b. 1909).
Elizabeth was active in several social and civic clubs including the Ladies Music Club, the Modern Classics Club, and the Red Cross. During World War I she was active instructing others to make surgical dressings. In 1919, she was appointed as a member of the board of regents for the Oklahoma College for Women by than Governor Robertson. Elizabeth was active with suffrage work at the county and state level. She chaired the Oklahoma City Liberty Loan campaign, which raised thousands of dollars. In 1918, Elizabeth chaired the finance committee of the Oklahoma State Campaign Committee for the state suffrage association.
Elizabeth died November 17, 1947 in Oklahoma City.
Sources
1920 United States Federal Census. Ancestry.com. Lehi, Utah: Ancestry.com Operations, 2021.
Find a Grave https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/45078094/elizabeth-pearl-ames
The Daily Oklahoman. Newspapers.com. [Online database from Ancestry.com.] Lehi, Utah: Ancestry.com Operations, 2021.
The Oklahoma City Times. (Oklahoma City, OK), Chronicling America: Historic American Newspapers. [Online database.] Washington, DC: The Library of Congress, 2021.
Stanton, Elizabeth Cady, Susan B Anthony, Matilda Joslyn Gage, and Ida Husted Harper, eds., History of Woman Suffrage, vol. 6 (1922), p. 531. [LINK]