America's Forgotten Suffragists | Nicole Evelina

America's Forgotten Suffragists: Virginia and Francis Minor

Extended Synopsis

In America's Forgotten Suffragists: Virginia and Francis Minor, Nicole Evelina resurrects the legacy of the "Mother of Suffrage in Missouri" and her husband, returning them to their rightful place in American history. St. Louis residents Virginia and Francis Minor forever altered the trajectory of women's rights by taking the issue of female enfranchisement to the Supreme Court for the first and only time in 1875—a monumental legal achievement uneclipsed even by their better-known peers like Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton. Despite Virginia founding the nation's first organization strictly dedicated to women's suffrage in 1867, and the couple pioneering the argument that women were granted voting rights under the Fourteenth Amendment, their names have largely faded from public memory.

This definitive biography traces their remarkable journey from slave-holding Virginians to highly lauded civilian workers during the Civil War, and ultimately to the forefront of the early suffrage movement. Beyond the courtroom, Francis became a prolific writer and one of the movement's fiercest male allies, while Virginia instigated national tax revolts and campaigned alongside Anthony across the Midwest. Evelina's comprehensive work reveals how two ordinary people, united in cause and intellect, profoundly changed the course of civil rights history.

Key Features

• First Definitive Biography: The premiere historical account focusing exclusively on the joint legacy of Virginia and Francis Minor.
• Legal History Highlight: Details the couple's pioneering 1875 Supreme Court case that argued for women's enfranchisement under the Fourteenth Amendment.
• Archival Imagery: Includes selected historical photographs and document plates that bring the 19th-century suffrage movement to life.

Reader Targeting

• Enthusiasts of 19th-century American history and the women's suffrage movement.
• Readers of feminist biography and unsung historical figures.
• Scholars and students of constitutional law and civil rights advocacy.

About the Author

Nicole Evelina is a historical fiction and non-fiction author whose meticulous research brings the forgotten women of history back to the forefront. Her work spans multiple eras, consistently spotlighting the untold stories of strong, influential figures whose contributions have been overlooked by mainstream historical narratives.

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