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Show THE HISTORY BLAZER rYEH'S OF UTAH'S PAST FR0. M THE Utah State Historical Societ~ r 300 Rio Grande Salt Lake Citp ITT 8- 1101 ( 801) 533- 3300 FAX ( 801) 533- 3503 Martha Hughes Cannon- America's First Woman State Senator IT JUST MAY BE THE MOST MEMORABLE YEAR IN Utah politics, Not only was - 1896 the year -, of Utah's admission to the Union, but Utahns also voted the first woman state senator in the United States into office. Dr. Martha Hughes Cannon was one of five Democrats running for the five seats in the Sixth Senatorial District in Salt Lake County. The fact that Angus M. Cannon, her husband, was one of five Republicans vying for the same positions added to the publicity surrounding the campaign. Only the top five vote- getters would win. Martha, who received over 4,000 more votes than her husband, and the other Democrats all won. Martha was born July 1, 1857, in northern Wales to Peter and Elizabeth Evans Hughes. After converting to the Mormon faith the family immigrated to Utah and settled in Salt Lake City. From a young age Martha set high goals for herself and even dreamed of becoming a physician. After a period of fiugal living she had saved enough money to enter the University of Michigan medical school in 1878. She graduated two years later at age twenty- three and then entered the University of Pennsylvania's department of medicine for additional training. At the Pennsylvania school she was the only woman in a class of seventy- five when she graduated in 1882. She also studied at the National School of Elocution and Oratory to improve her speaking skills. Upon returning to Utah she opened a private practice but was shortly called to be resident physician of the Deseret Hospital in Salt Lake City. In this position she met Angus Cannon, who was serving on the hospital board, . and. mechisfoud-- wifean.- October 6, 1884. Martha put her medical career on hold for extended periods of exile in Europe and California to help prevent her husband's arrest under federal anti- polygamy laws. After government prosecution of polygamy largely ended, she felt free to begin her public life and soon became an active voice in the woman suffrage movement. With woman suffrage achieved in Utah, she traveled in 1898 to Washington, D. C., to deliver a rousing speech to a congressional committee in favor of granting women the vote nationally. In her career as a state senator Martha directed most of her efforts toward promoting public health. She introduced legislation providing for the education of deaf, mute, and blind children and for the creation of a State Board of Health. Naturally, Governor Heber M. Wells appointed her as an initial member of the newly created health board where she helped shape its purpose and direction. ( more) Dr. Cannon spent the remainder of her life near her children in Los Angeles where she worked at the Graves Clinic and in the orthopedic department of the General Hospital. Her eventful life as mother, state senator, physician, suffragist, and public health advocate ended on July 10, 1932, at the age of seventy- five. Sowces: Jean Bickmore White, " Martha H. cannon," in Sister Saints, ed. Vicky Burgess- Olson ( Provo, Utah: Brigham Young University Press, 1978), pp. 385- 97; Annie Laurie Black, " h Woman Senator," Salt Lake Herald, November 11, 1896; Constance L. Lieber, "' The Goose Hangs High': Excerpts fbm the Letters of Martha Hughes Cannon," Utah Historical Quarterly 48 ( winter 1980): 37- 48. THE HISTORYB LAZERis produced by theUtah State Historical Society and funded in part by a grant from the Utah Statehood Centennial Commission. For mote information about the Historical Society telephone 533- 3500. "' |
