"AMERICAN WOMAN" staged play reading rescheduled for March 28

The League of Women Voters Bartlesville has rescheduled its "AMERICAN WOMAN: A Brief History and Exciting True Story of the Women Suffragists" production for March 28 at Theater Bartlesville, 312 S. Dewey Avenue.

The hour-long staged play reading was postponed earlier this month because some cast members had been exposed to COVID-19.

Doors will open at 6:30 p.m. The performance will be followed by a brief reception in the lobby. Seating is general admission.

"American Woman" charts the course of the decades-long struggle of American women to push for the passage and ratification of the 19^th Amendment, which gave American women the right to vote, by stating that “the right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex.”

The script was adapted by Shelby Brammer from a full-length play written in 2020 by Jan Dreiling and the late Joan Dreisker (Celebrate! 100 Years of Woman Suffrage) for the Bartlesville Women’s Network.

The remarkable history of that struggle for suffrage (the right to vote) is full of unforgettable characters, such as Lucretia Mott, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, Sojourner Truth, Alice Paul, Lucy Burns, Olympia Brown, Ida B. Wells, and others.

Their struggle was marked by steadfast friendships between extraordinary women leaders, and enormous fortitude in the face of hardship among the rank-and-file suffragists (such as beatings in jail, and forced feedings during hunger strikes). Their struggle continued throughout the Civil War and World War I.

President Woodrow Wilson became both enemy and ally to the Suffragists, until he finally, near the end of his life, supported passage of the 19^th Amendment.

This article originally appeared on Bartlesville Examiner-Enterprise: "AMERICAN WOMAN" production rescheduled for March 28