Bugg Stories vol. 1

the time for women to take their place and government has come and then my tears welled up their brains against the rock of gibraltar as to oppose it again he is susan b anthony's sentiment is yeah i'm a seventy five years ago in tennessee women won the right to ninety the memo to the constitution came down to a vote in the tennessee legislature meeting a special session the ratification question past year by one vote there'd been an intense fight in tennessee that summer of nineteen twenty over the idea of allowing women to vote candace rose anderson has written a play about this time in national it's called perfect thirty six actually the perfect thirty six is a quote i am kim suffragist i think showed that they had some humor they needed thirty six states in order to ratify the amendment and catherine kinney who was one of the leaders in nashville said wouldn't it be glorious to have thirty six state come

from way down here and end us efforts country where the mosque next day and she talked about the perfect three six and was common phrase what would be the basis for the opposition in tennessee are for the some of the opposition really use a number of different convention center in order to try to convince people that women did not want the boat that this was a plot by some wild women or something like that that's been foisted on tennessee women and date used literature that was very racist really what was a literature literature that talked about the negro women's suffrage because it enough black women african american women were allowed to vote that would make it would be it would be harder to keep black men from voting and they were able to sway legislators with this kind of literature as frederick douglass said our guys up nothing without command and this was a change

in the old guard of the south and it really had not so much no matter what anyone says i'm totally convinced this didn't have that much to do with gender it had everything to do with power let me play a bit of tape from the rehearsal if you're playing there is sort of a local hero involved here are a man named harry thomas byrne who was a legislator and the cast a final vote just let's we'll hear just a bit of the same level of the wasp evolved reputation snob today suggests l baltimore mayor jeffrey seventeen million women from political slavery is mine and i will live yeah we go i've always taken a

lot is a legend here has occurred apparently hail mary thomas burnett got a letter from his mom saying you better vote for that button to the right and yes she said hi ryan vote for suffrage and although he had voted over and over again to table the amendment i he voted at this final second to vote the way his mother told them to and those were his exact words i always take my mother's advice you have trouble as a playwright at me in making the issue really does seem to be a long time ago that this was an argument well there are people here still alive who remember this happening i think that what happened here was a lot of the women that worked so hard to make this happen and it was a huge incredible endeavor we have pictures of women throwing and julian a bucket for the cause and date there's a line at the end of the show where one

person says the man that i know or sand gang god now this infernal women's vote question is over and then the last line is said no no the women i know are saying now at last we can begin talking with us from wpln candace rose anderson her play perfect thirty six opens tomorrow night in actual cash there's a flap been a philatelic community over the new stamp commemorating the seventy fifth anniversary of the nineteenth amendment many stamp collectors a hated npr's melissa block has our story the women suffrage stamp won't be released until tomorrow but already it's design has got stamp collectors like john wayne injure of crest would kentucky taking pain in hand and putting stamps and tang to send a letter told in stamp news in fact win and your calls it the ugliest mishmash he's seen in forty seven years of stamp collecting

another letter writer hurled what is perhaps a philatelist most piercing insult i am not even going to buy it for postage the main complaints to modern too cluttered too much stuff in a tiny space there is a remarkable amount of imagery packed into the women's suffrage stamp in a little under two square inches there are two layered photographs of demonstrations one of suffragettes in nineteen thirteen another showing supporters of the equal rights amendment in nineteen seventy six the words freedom equality and progress or superimpose several times in a montage over photos of clouds and the us capitol along the bottom run the words nineteenth amendment nineteen twenty to nineteen ninety five this is one of very few stamps to use photographs and be designed and computer and that's part of why this citizen stamp advisory committee chose it chairwoman virginia no peta says the committee wanted to push the in her words envelope i like the active modern in

trying to draw on some of the moderate none of the country and i think it's really appropriate for any shoot at the company about the progress of women sam again at are not exactly would stamp collectors finger for according to michael lawrence editor and publisher of lynn stamp news and stan said is by the standards of the richard nixon stamp wasn't controversial among lawrence as readers as it was among the general public nixon did fit the bill but lauren says there are recent trends in stamp subject matter that rankle they have pictures of what they have paid for the work that they have pictures of athletes they are divided into it in the merchandising africa merchandising efforts like the licensing agreements the postal service has now so that elvis or marilyn monroe end up not just in the upper righthand corner but also on t shirts coffee mugs hats pins and posters michael oren says that commercialization means stamps have dramatically changed gone are the delicate firearms and

sandals from the old line engraving process and are being bold images of the great blown up they didn't look like it in the last twenty twenty five years ago to the day that all the credit availability where does all this debate leave the designer of the women suffrage than a program in the graphic artist says she's no stranger to controversy and even welcomes the opportunity to shake up the world of stamp collectors they would say you know there is no movement no in a way it's a good thing to get rid of him but i think it means that people are actually stopping and looking and thinking and i believe that view when you look at the campaign and if they have that much meaning that it could upset you and it changes you an advocate there'll be one hundred five million women suffrage dance printed available tomorrow

just for perspective there were five hundred million elvis stamps and four hundred million maryland stance and finally there's one thing the detractors of the stamp want to make clear their howls of aesthetic protest should in no way be taken to mean that they think the nineteenth amendment is wrong as one critic wrote i have worked with women and respected and admired them for nearly half a century i've even been happily married to one of them for more than forty seven years i'm melissa block in new york at an era