Tanner Conley
The 2019 Women’s Suffrage Limerick contest ran from Sept. 3 to Oct. 6. Over 50 total submissions came in from all over the state. The winners got the glory associated with the victory and also recorded their limericks on Wyoming Public Radio, which aired on Mon.
Renee Laegreid, UW history professor, judged the contest and could not be happier with the results.
“It went really well. How many entries will we get? One maybe two, but 50?” Laegreid said.
The contest was part of the buildup to the state-wide Wyoming Women’s Suffrage Celebration. The goal of the celebration is “to honor our local contribution to history and foster broader recognition of it beyond our state, and to encourage research and advocacy on the right, privilege, and responsibility of the vote.”
The celebration will last from Dec. 10 2019 until Sept. 6 2020. The celebration’s length is designed to mirror the amount of time between the granting of voting rights to women in Dec.1869 through to the first woman casting her vote in Sept. 1870. The celebration will start with a ceremony in Cheyenne on Dec. 10.
These are the winners and their submissions:
The men in South Pass called her ma’am.With Bill Bright, they cooked up a plan.By one vote they wonWhat can’t be undone.That women can vote like a man. -Kristine McGuire, Laramie WY
Democracy must include allLest freedom stumble and fallSuffrage and thenBoth women and men Can hasten to liberty’s call- Tom Spence, Buffalo WY
Frontiersmen in powerful roles
In suffrage had ulterior goals
Men of color can vote?
We’d better take note!
White ladies please come to the polls!
-Louisa Hunkerstorm, Lander WY
The wonderful day that Ms. SwainWas no longer wishing in vainHer opinion to castFor it counted at lastThe right, now, the women would retain-Judi Boyce, Pinedale WY
Out on the hardscrabble plainsWomen fought for political gainsPast the U.S.A’s borderThey kept courtroom orderThey used both their grit and their brains-Louisa Hunkerstorm, Lander WY
