Evening Public Ledger — January 8, 1915
The Equal Franchise Society ticket notice naming Miss Martha Davis, treasurer, 1822 Pine Street.
House History · Primary Sources
The suffrage record of 1822 Pine Street.
Two printed lines tie this address to the fight for women's votes: a December 1913 tax protest by a resident, and a January 1915 newspaper notice selling Equal Franchise Society tickets from this house. This page presents exactly what the record shows — and says plainly where it stops.
Dec 1913
Mrs. Henry C. Davis, of 1822 Pine Street, is named in tax-resistance coverage after Dr. Anna Howard Shaw's national call.
Jan 8, 1915
The Evening Public Ledger lists Equal Franchise Society luncheon tickets for sale through the treasurer at this address.
$1.50
The price of a luncheon ticket, “obtained through the treasurer, Miss Martha Davis, 1822 Pine street.”
1920
The Nineteenth Amendment is ratified — five years after Pennsylvania voters defeated a state suffrage referendum in 1915.
The Household
The Davis women of Pine Street.
By December 1904, the names at this address belonged to the Davis family. The Philadelphia Inquirer's society column announced ‘At Home’ receiving days for “Mrs. Henry C. Davis and the Misses Davis, of 1822 Pine street” — the choreographed afternoons when a household opened its door to callers.
A decade later, the same household appears in print on the other side of a political fight. Naomi Lawton Davis — Mrs. Henry C. Davis — lent her name to the suffragists' tax-resistance campaign, and Miss Martha Davis served as treasurer of the Equal Franchise Society, selling luncheon tickets from this address. Naomi Lawton Davis died at 1822 Pine Street on May 21, 1918, two years before the Nineteenth Amendment was ratified — a date our research cites from obituary text, though that clipping is not yet part of the published archive.
December 1913
“Resistance to taxation without representation has my entire sympathy.”
Mrs. Henry C. Davis, of 1822 Pine Street · December 1913
The Tax Protest
December 1913: taxation without representation.
In December 1913, Dr. Anna Howard Shaw — president of the National American Woman Suffrage Association — called on women to refuse taxation while they were denied the vote. Coverage of the campaign, preserved in archives of tax resistance in the U.S. suffrage movement, records the response of “Mrs. Henry C. Davis of 1822 Pine Street.”
Her statement invoked her own family history: her Quaker forbears, she said, had protested on the same principle. It is one sentence in a newspaper — but it fixes a national campaign to this exact address, through a woman who lived in these rooms.
The Ticket Notice
January 8, 1915: tickets from this address.
The Evening Public Ledger of January 8, 1915 announced an Equal Franchise Society luncheon. Covers were $1.50 apiece, and “they may be obtained through the treasurer, Miss Martha Davis, 1822 Pine street.” The announced speakers included Norman Hapgood, the magazine editor, and Miss Anne Martin.
That is the whole claim, and it is enough: in the winter before Pennsylvania's 1915 suffrage referendum, the treasurer of the Equal Franchise Society was selling the movement's tickets from this house.
House Style
What we can and cannot document.
This house publishes its paper trail, so it holds itself to the paper. The record shows tickets sold from this address and tax resistance by a resident; it does not show meetings held in these rooms. Here is the line, drawn plainly.
The record shows
- In December 1904, the Philadelphia Inquirer announced “At Home” receiving days for Mrs. Henry C. Davis and the Misses Davis, of 1822 Pine Street.
- In December 1913, suffrage tax-resistance coverage named Mrs. Henry C. Davis of 1822 Pine Street, with her statement of support quoted in full.
- On January 8, 1915, the Evening Public Ledger reported Equal Franchise Society luncheon tickets at $1.50, obtainable through the treasurer, Miss Martha Davis, 1822 Pine Street.
- On May 21, 1918, Philadelphia obituary columns recorded the death of Naomi Lawton, widow of Henry C. Davis, at 1822 Pine Street (obituary text cited in project research; the clipping itself is not yet in the published archive).
The record does not show
- That the Equal Franchise Society held its meetings inside this house — the 1915 notice shows tickets sold from the address, nothing more.
- That the house served as a headquarters for the movement — no source in the archive makes that claim.
- Where the January 1915 luncheon itself took place — the notice names the speakers and the ticket price, not the venue.
- Any details of gatherings in the parlors beyond the society 'At Homes' announced in the press.
Before the Davises
The Drexel connection.
The house's first long-term owners were John and Mary Ann Laning Roset, who bought the newly built townhouse in 1854 (period records attribute the block’s development to builder John McCrea, though no surviving document ties him to this deed). By then their eldest daughter, Ellen Bicking Rozet (born February 21, 1829; the family name appears as both Roset and Rozet in the records), was already married: on August 13, 1850, she wed the banker Anthony Joseph Drexel in Philadelphia.
Drexel became the dominant partner of Drexel & Co., founded Drexel, Morgan & Co. with J.P. Morgan in 1871, and founded the institution that became Drexel University in 1891. Ellen died on November 27, 1891, weeks before the Drexel Institute opened its doors. The connection to 1822 Pine Street runs through the family, not the deed — Ellen's parents owned this house, and the marriage bound the address into one of Philadelphia's great banking families.
Sources
Check the claims yourself.
The primary documents behind this page live in the house archive. The December 1913 tax-resistance statement is preserved in published archives of the U.S. suffrage movement's tax resistance and is quoted here from that record.
Philadelphia Inquirer — December 11, 1904
The society listing announcing “At Home” days for Mrs. Henry C. Davis and the Misses Davis at this address.
Stay Here
Sleep in the house with the paper trail.
The rooms where the Davis women lived are the rooms your group stays in — 8 bedrooms across five floors, two blocks from Rittenhouse Square, with the archive published for anyone to read.