Purdue Libraries and School of Information Studies News

New Online Exhibition Offers Unique Insight into Purdue’s Involvement in Women’s Suffrage Movement

August 25th, 2023

Purdue Archives and Special Collections presents a new online exhibition on women’s suffrage. “Not Given but Earned: Women’s Fight for the Vote” is an inspirational collection of materials from the Archives’ vault, showing how Purdue women, students, and faculty participated in this historic movement.  

Did you know that it took more than 70 years for women to gain the right to vote in the United States? Hoosier women were active participants in the women’s suffrage movement from its early days  and some even went on to lead national and international women’s rights organizations. Purdue students, staff and faculty organized and advocated for women’s suffrage both on and off campus. 

However, when the 19th Amendment passed, it only guaranteed white women the right to vote and left many African Americans, Indigenous, and other people of color, who had fought alongside white suffragists, disenfranchised for years to come.   

Visit the online exhibition to learn how the women’s suffrage movement left a lasting legacy in the history of the United States and how it continues to have an impact today.