By William “Skip” Deegans
One can only imagine how surprised folks in Ronceverte were in 1907 when Carrie Nation, radical leader of the temperance movement and arguably one of the most famous women in the United States at the time, walked down Railroad Avenue and sought to talk to anyone who would listen to her. Six feet tall and weighing 180 pounds, she was a formidable figure and readily recognizable from her photos in newspapers and magazines.
Born in Kentucky in 1846, her father was a well-to-do slave-holding farmer who lost his wealth during the Civil War. The family moved to Texas and Missouri. Nation attended college, became a teacher and married Charles Gloyd, a physician and alcoholic. She and Gloyd were divorced, but the marriage was impactful. She married again in 1874 to David Nation, an attorney and newspaper owner. They moved from Missouri to Texas and then to Medicine Lodge, Kansas, where Nation organized a chapter of the Woman’s Christian Temperance Union that opposed drinking of alcohol. The chapter demonstrated by praying and singing hymns in front of saloons and men’s clubs.
Nation received a sign from God to go to Kiowa, Kansas and smash the saloons by throwing stones. She and her followers destroyed three saloons. When a tornado hit the area afterwards, she saw that as affirmation of God’s intent. She went from throwing stones to wielding a hatchet to destroy more saloons. She divorced in 1901 and began publishing a newspaper, The Smasher’s Mail. She was arrested repeatedly and used her lecture fees and sales of stick pins in the shape of a hatchet to pay her fines.
In 1903, she laid down her hatchet and took a more peaceful approach to her opposition to drinking. Her second attempt at publishing was a magazine called The Hatchet in which she advocated for the women’s right to vote. She published an autobiography in 1903 and made enough money to buy a house in Kansas City to use as a shelter for wives, mothers, and children of drunkards. That may have been the beginning of the movement in this country to establish shelters for abused women.
Nation died in 1911 in a Kansas hospital following a nervous breakdown. She is credited with helping to pave the way for two amendments to the United States Constitution: the 18th amendment that prohibited the sale of alcohol and the 19th amendment that gave women the right to vote. While we don’t know if her visit to Ronceverte led to the closing of any saloons, it was reported that “she talked voluably and incessantly from the time she struck the town till she left – at the depot, on the streets, in the hotels, stores and everywhere, hardly stopping to take a breath.”
Sources: Greenbrier Independent, State Historical Society of Missouri, Library of Congress, Kansas City Weekly Journal.
