Stratford: The Stories We Tell

Stratford’s Pre-eminent Women’s Rights Leader

By David Wright
Town Historian

Stratford’s Pre-eminent Women’s Rights Leader

If you were to Google Alice Caroline Judson, your search would produce no results, and, yet, her life had a disproportionally large impact on her beloved Town of Stratford.  No books have been written about Alice. As a matter of fact, we can only locate one book that contains any information pertaining to Alice’s extraordinary life.

From the History of Bridgeport and Vicinity Vol II by George Curtis Waldo, Jr., 1917, we find:

“Alice Caroline, born September 27, 1859, in Stratford, was educated in public and private schools and in the Sedgwick Academy. She gave much of her time and attention to the care of her father, and she has always taken a deep interest in church and Sunday school work. She is an ardent advocate of the cause of woman suffrage and was among the first to organize a woman suffrage movement in Stratford, in which association she has filled the office of vice president and treasurer and is now president. She has also served as a delegate to the county and state conventions and was foremost in the movement toward having the state legislature pass a bill to give women the right to vote for president and also in municipal affairs and on the temperance question. She is a woman of broad intellect and takes an active part in all movements that have for their object the benefit of the poor and oppressed. In 1910 she took a trip around the world in the ship Cleveland, visiting all places of interest in different countries, including Japan, where she visited her sister, who is a teacher in that country.  Miss Judson resides at the Dunbar homestead on East Broadway, where many attractive improvements have been made.”

Alice’s young life was marked by searing tragedy and loss. Alice’s mother passed away when Alice was six years old. Her father’s grocery store in Paradise Green burned down two years later. Alice’s father turned to Alice to fill the gaping domestic hole left by Alice’s mother’s passing. Alice assumed a maternal, caring role for her family and for her town. 

Alice’s youngest sister, Elizabeth, took ill and passed away at the age of 23. Alice was Elizabeth’s primary caregiver. Alice’s father became ill in his later years and Alice cared for him until his death in 1905. Alice’s sister, Maria, was a teacher and principal of the primary grades at Center School. A couple of years before Maria passed away in 1911, Maria contracted a debilitating illness requiring Alice to care for her until Maria’s passing in 1911. Alice’s only brother, Stiles Jr., one of the most influential men in Connecticut at that time, died young at age 51 in 1914. Alice took on the role of Executrix of Stiles’ estate, and was largely responsible for the placing of the Stiles Judson monument on West Broad green across from the Perry House.

If it sounds as though Alice’s life was bounded by family tragedy and loss, she did not let any of that slow her down. In 1889, Alice took an active role in the celebration of the town’s 250^th anniversary.  At a time when few women would have been traveling the country and the world, Alice was one of the first Stratfordites to visit the Chicago World’s Fair in 1893. In 1910, Alice set out to visit her missionary sister, Cornelia, who was serving in Japan. Alice traveled through Europe, Egypt, China, and India before meeting up with Cornelia in Japan. If Alice travelled with a companion, that person has not been identified.

When Alice returned from her world travels, she spent 1911 giving stereopticon presentations of her journey to audiences in Stratford and Bridgeport. In 1912, Alice became the first vice-president of the resurgent Suffrage movement in Stratford. Alice insisted, when the Stratford Suffrage Association began, that it not affiliate with the state suffrage association. Alice found the state organization a bit too conservative and dispassionate for her tastes. This placed Alice in a bit of conflict with Katharine Hepburn’s mother, Katharine Houghton Hepburn, who was an executive officer (later President) of the Connecticut Suffrage Association at the time. Alice and Mrs. Hepburn reconciled their differences, and, in 1916, Alice invited Mrs. Hepburn to be the featured speaker at the organizing convention of the Fairfield County Suffrage Association which held its inaugural meeting in Stratford.

Alice represented the antithesis of all the negative traits the anti-Suffrage supporters attributed to women active in the Suffrage movement. Alice dressed like a lady, attended to her family and her community, and ran for town offices when those opportunities presented themselves after women gained the local town vote in Connecticut in 1893.  Alice was an officer, or a board member, of the following town and community organizations:  250th Town Anniversary celebration committee, 250th anniversary celebration of the Congregational Church, Christian Endeavor Society, delegate to state Suffrage convention in 1914, Delphian Society, delegate to the Fairfield County Suffrage Association, Foreign Missionary Society of the Methodist Church, Home Economic Committee, Ladies Aid Society, Library Board, Missionary Institute and League, Community House, Parent-Teachers Association, school committee, Republican Women’s Association, Stratford Canning Kitchen, Stratford League of Women Voters, Stratford War Food Exhibit, weekly prayer meetings, Women’s Service League of the Congregational Church, and Young People’s Society of Christian Endeavor.

If Stratford was ever home to a more influential leader, it would be difficult to say who that leader was. Sadly, Alice’s life and legacy have been lost over the past several years.