A Woman Ahead of Her Time

By Paul Moscardini

In 1848 at the Seneca Falls Convention, the first women's rights convention, passed a resolution in favor of women's suffrage despite opposition from some of its organizers, who believed the idea was too extreme. In 1888, 40 years later, John Greenleaf Whittier, Amesbury resident and gadfly to the nation’s conscience wrote in support of women’s suffrage:

“I can only reiterate my hearty sympathy with the object of the association, and bid it take heart and assurance in view of all that has been accomplished. There is no easy royal road to a reform of this kind, but if the progress has been slow there has been no step backward. The barriers which at first seemed impregnable in the shape of custom and prejudice have been undermined and their fall is certain. A prophecy of your triumph at no distant day is in the air; your opponents feel it and believe it.”

In 1920, the 19th Amendment to the United States Constitution ratified the right of women to vote. In 1933, Annie Webster became the first woman in the history of Amesbury to be elected to the Board of Selectmen. Annie Webster was born to Daniel and Helen Webster in 1879 at 54 Market Street, then part of Salisbury, a house in which she would live until her death in 1964 at age 85.

54 Market Street as it appeared on the 1890 bird’s eye map of Amesbury and as it appears today.

At a young age, she entered business with her father in Webster’s Dry Goods Store on Main Street. She remained in that line of work until her later years. At one point she expanded her business interests to include a small “convenience store” at 358 Main Street, which she called “The Polly Handy Shop,” named after the privateer built in Amesbury during the war of 1812.

A newspaper advertisement for the Polly Handy Shop

However, what made Annie Webster a household name in the town were not her business endeavors. Rather, it was her devotion to public service and her vision of what was good for the town that drove her to exercise her newly won right to be an active participant in town affairs.

Annie Webster was long active in the civic and social town affairs through membership in the Grange, the Whittier Club, and the Main Street Baptist Church. In 1933, perhaps prompted by the events of the Great Depression, Annie Webster entered the political arena by seeking a seat on the Board of Selectmen.

She won, thus becoming Amesbury’s first woman Selectman. As the Amesbury Daily News reported, “In more ways than one the town election of 1933 will go down in history as one with many features. To begin with the first woman ever to hold a berth as selectman or rather selectwoman was elected when Annie Webster defeated Chairman J. Elmer Brierly of last years board by 903 votes and Gonthier, her nearest competitor by 671 votes.”

This victory was the beginning of a civic and political career that would span nearly 50 years. A good deal of her effort in this realm was generated by the impact of the Great Depression on Amesbury. Although a Republican, Annie in April of 1934 was appointed Emergency Relief Administrator, a position that was established under President Franklin Roose-velt’s New Deal Emergency Relief Act that was created to deal with the economic crisis created by the depression. In this capacity, she oversaw the distribution of $70,000 [nearly 1.3 million dollars in 2019 dollars] to be used to provide work for unemployed people. One of those distributions was to pay 2 men to paint the Bartlett School and Junior High School for $386 [nearly $1,900 in 2019 dollars].

In September of 1934, in her ERA capacity, Annie Webster pushed for the hiring of more Amesbury men by the Public Works Administration, another New Deal program, to work on the resurfacing of Main Street and Evans Place.

According to a Newburyport Daily News article of March 1933, Selectman Webster also promoted the idea that “work of the social welfare type needs to be undertaken in many instances where it would be possible, with the proper kind of supervision, to better home conditions.” She proposed that a volunteer committee be established to provide such sup-port.

Despite her support and participation in what could be described as “progressive” social policies, she remained more traditional; she opposed ending Prohibition. In 1919, the 18th Amendment to the United States Constitution forbade the sale and distribution of alcoholic beverages. In 1933, the 21st amendment repealed it. Across the nation, many communities sought to remain “dry,” that is free of the commercial sale of alcohol. Annie, perhaps because of her Baptist faith, Baptist denominations were in the forefront of promoting Prohibition, appealed to the voters of Ames-bury to keep the town dry. In the Newburyport Herald of 1933 she was quoted as saying,

“I wish to make a plea to the men and women of Amesbury to vote ‘No” on the referendum at Monday’s special election. As has been said before, what we need is bread, not beer in Amesbury. Perhaps no one realizes this more than I. As I go in and out of so many houses in Amesbury and view conditions, I speak for the boys and girls, who cannot speak for themselves. Some years ago when my father, the late Daniel Web-ster, was selectman, he was walking up Friend Street one day when he was met by a young lad who said, ‘You won’t vote for licenses to sell beer, will you, Mr. Webster, for if there is beer in Amesbury, papa will spend all his money for it and we will have nothing to eat!’ Mr. Webster replied that he would not vote for the licenses. Vote “No” for the boys and girls of Amesbury.”

Although re-elected to the Board of Selectmen in 1934, by the end of 1935 Annie would no longer be one of the towns elected leaders, although she did seek a variety of elective offices, for the most part her life would revolve around her church, the Market Street Baptist Church and the Grange. In 1946, the Market Street Baptist Church honored her for over 50 years of service to the church. In 1952, the National Grange of the Patrons of Husbandry recognized her 50 years of service to “agriculture and mankind.” As an example of her concern regarding the role of nature in a town’s life, in that same year, Annie opposed the removal of a tree from the front of her house that had been planted by her father. Complaints had been made that it and others like it along the side of the market Street were a hazard to cars. In this instance the needs of modern society were denied in favor of retaining the tree.

Annie Webster could be considered a woman ahead of her time, and some might even say eccentric. When she died in 1964 at age 85, she left behind a legacy of uniqueness. She had been one of the last people in town to give up the horse and buggy. Her buggy, a Hume 1906 cut under model, shown below, can still be seen at the Bartlett Museum Carriage shed.

Her love of animals was reflected in her will, leaving a large estate to her pets and stipulating that the house should be maintained for their use. Her cat Tippy, a favorite of Annie’s, lived on another 13 years after her mistresses death. In 1977, upon Tippy’s death, her estate was liquidated and the proceeds gifted to the Hampton Beach Community Church.

Her shop, “The Handy Polly,” on Point Shore reverted to a residence sometime in the late 1940s.