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Anna Howard Shaw

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The Resume

    (February 14, 1847-July 2, 1919)
    Born in Newcastle-on-Tyne, England, United Kingdom
    Methodist minister and suffragette
    President of the National American Woman Suffrage Association (1904-15)

Why she might be annoying:

    She earned a medical degree, but never practiced as a physician, taking up the causes of temperance and women's suffrage instead.
    As NAWSA President, she failed to devise a national strategy for coordinating local suffrage efforts.
    One biographer noted, 'Her gifts were many, but administrative ability was not among them.'
    She was forced out as head of the NAWSA due to repeated clashes with Alice Paul and other more militant suffragettes over tactics.
    She died a year and two months short of witnessing the ratification of the 19th Amendment granting women's suffrage. (Although she did at least see the Amendment get through Congress.)

Why she might not be annoying:

    At age 12, while living on a frontier farm in Michigan, the combination of her father's frequent absences, her mother's nervous breakdown, and her older brother's illness left her caring for the family, which included clearing land, planting crops, digging a well and laying the floor in their cabin.
    At fifteen, she became a teacher in a frontier school, walking eight miles a day to earn $4 a week.
    She was a powerful orator with a 'rich and musical' voice.
    She became the first woman to earn the Distinguished Service Medal, for her work during World War I heading the Women's Committee of the Council of National Defense.
    She said, 'Nothing bigger can come to a human being than to love a great cause more than life itself.'
    In 30 Rock, Liz Lemon proposed replacing Valentine's Day ('a sham created by card companies') with Anna Howard Shaw Day.

Credit: C. Fishel


Featured in the following Annoying Collections:

Year In Review:

    For 2024, as of last weekly ranking, Out of 3 Votes: 100% Annoying
    In 2023, Out of 1 Votes: 100% Annoying
    In 2022, Out of 2 Votes: 0% Annoying
    In 2021, Out of 9 Votes: 44.44% Annoying
    In 2020, Out of 1 Votes: 0% Annoying
    In 2019, Out of 2 Votes: 100% Annoying
    In 2018, Out of 11 Votes: 45.45% Annoying
    In 2017, Out of 49 Votes: 73.47% Annoying
    In 2016, Out of 6 Votes: 50.0% Annoying
    In 2015, Out of 10 Votes: 50.0% Annoying
    In 2014, Out of 10 Votes: 50.0% Annoying