The politicization of girlhood: from the Gibson girl to the National Woman's Party, 1895-1920

This article examines the development of the girl figure from cultural icon to political tool during the early twentieth century U.S. fight for women's suffrage. The paper links cultural depictions from Charles Dana Gibson and Nell Brinkley to the political work of Nina E. Allender, the official cartoonist for the Congressional Union for Woman Suffrage (CU), (later the National Woman's Party (NWP)). By arguing that NWP members manipulated cultural understandings of girlhood for their political purposes, the article engages in historiographical arguments about the exclusively maternalist nature of early feminism and contributes to historical knowledge about girlhood's political potential in the progressive era United States.