Catherine Flanagan

Catherine Mary Flanagan was born on August 19, 1888, in Hartford, Connecticut,[1] the second of seven children of Irish immigrant parents.[2] Her father had moved to the US as a political exile after participating in the Irish Freedom movement, and following his death, she began work as a stenographer and as a bookkeeper at age 13.[2] She became involved in the women's suffrage movement in the 1910s, and was hired as the secretary of the Connecticut Woman Suffrage Association (CWSA) in 1915.[3] In 1917, Flanagan took vacation leave to travel to Washington, D.C., to join the National Woman's Party (NWP) in the Silent Sentinels protest outside the White House.[2] Flanagan and five other suffragists were arrested on charges of "obstructing traffic and unlawful assembly" and were jailed at the Occoquan Workhouse for 30 days after they refused to pay a $10 fine.[3] After her release, Flanagan wrote an account of her treatment in jail that was circulated in the national press and attracted public support for the suffrage movement.[3] She resigned from the CWSA and formally joined the NWP.[2] In 1920, she delivered Connecticut's ratification document endorsing the Nineteenth Amendment to the State Department.[2] Following the passage of the amendment, she turned her attention to campaigning for recognition of the Irish Republic.[3]

Flanagan moved to Utah and married William H. Leary in 1921; a year later, they had a son. She died August 3, 1927, in Salt Lake City from complications of an ectopic pregnancy.[2]

Flanagan was inducted into the Connecticut Women's Hall of Fame in 2020.[3] She is memorialized at the Turning Point Suffragist Memorial in Lorton, Virginia.[4]