Greater Haverhill League of Women Voters’ Kallister Green-Byrd (left) and Kay Herlihy were joined by League volunteer Josiah Morrow to promote the march on WHAV. (WHAV News photograph)
The Greater Haverhill League of Women Voters is holding a Suffragette March on Sunday, Oct. 20 to commemorate the 100th anniversary of women’s suffrage and the founding of the national League of Women Voters.
The League’s Vice President Kay Herlihy and Kallister Green-Byrd joined WHAV’s Win Damon on “Win for Breakfast” to get the word out for the march. Green-Byrd, one of five founding members of the Haverhill League, discussed the group’s origins and focus.
“We feel that the more informed citizens are, the more civic engagement, the better they can be productive citizens in our society,” she said.
Herlihy, who chairs the Suffragette Committee organizing the march, told WHAV that the march takes place starting at 1 p.m. and proceeds across the Basiliere Bridge to the Haverhill Public Library, 99 Main St., Haverhill. The march is a recreation of an actual suffrage march, which took place in Haverhill over a century ago, according to Herlihy.
“We are reenacting an actual march that happened on May 2, 1914, where the leader of the national League of Women Voters led a parade across the Basiliere Bridge to Washington Square,” she said. “There were over 2,000 people there to listen to Carrie Chapman Catt.”
The march is followed by a reception at the library featuring a reenactor of famous suffragette Susan B. Anthony. The reception is free, but reservations are required by calling 978-821-5002.