Women's Events

What the Women Did During the 1912 Convention

by Rachael E. Martin, Club #25 Historian

The 1912 Rotary convention in Duluth included elaborate plans for the wives and daughters of attending Rotarians. The wives of Duluth Rotarians, led by Mrs. G. H. Bate as general chairman of the auxiliary, planned trips, excursions, teas, and banquets for the female guests.
 

The first meeting of the women would be a 5 o'clock tea on Tuesday, August 6, at the Woodland Café of the St. Louis Hotel. The new St. Louis Hotel claimed that the Woodland Café had no superior. With a seating capacity of 500, it was a strikingly beautiful decorated retreat. It boasted a full orchestra of unsurpassed music with Hutsell's mixed quartet, featuring Abe Pepinsky as violin soloist, Mr. Hughes, tenor, Miss Williams, contralto, Miss Withe, soprano, & Mr. Hutsell, baritone. The Woodland Café advertised that it was "cooled by the breezes of Lake Superior where the followers of the Bohemian way may feast according to their desire."
 

The Duluth Rotary auxiliary reserved 40 tables, seating 8 women each, with one Duluth matron as hostess at each table. The tables were to be decorated in Pink Japanese lilies and baby's breath, to complement the table appointments.
 

After the Tuesday tea, the ladies would attend an 8 o'clock reception for the men and women at the Commercial Club.
 

Wednesday at 10 in the morning, the ladies would travel by automobile to inspect the fish hatchery at Lester Park. In the afternoon, ladies would join their husbands in a motor trip around the boulevard. In the evening, the women would banquet at the Commercial Club while the men held a business meeting elsewhere. The decorations for the banquet would carry out the Rotary's colors of royal blue & gold with bouquets of asters and coreopsis.
 

Thursday, a 10 o'clock trolley ride was planned from one end of Duluth to the other for the ladies. At 2 o'clock they would join the men on a boat trip to Fond du Lac, then accompany the men in the evening on an excursion around the horn, concluding with informal dancing.
 

Friday plans for the ladies included a 10 o'clock shopping tour, general inspection of the city, and an afternoon trip up the Incline and out to the Point.
 

The Duluth Rotary auxiliary was all set to make their guests' stay in Duluth a pleasant and memorable experience.