Carry Nation

A Kansas Portrait

Carry Amelia Nation, originally Carrie Moore, was born in 1846 in Kentucky and lived in various states during her childhood. Her first marriage to Charles Gloyd, an alcoholic, made her an ardent temperance supporter. She moved to Medicine Lodge, Kansas, with David A. Nation, her second husband, in 1889 where she soon organized a local branch of the Woman's Christian Temperance Union. In 1900 she made newspaper headlines by wrecking several bars in Wichita. Throughout 1900 and 1901, she and supporters attacked a number of saloons in Enterprise, Winfield, Leavenworth, and Topeka. Kansas had a prohibition amendment so Nation argued that her attacks were not unlawful since saloons were illegal.

Nation was driven by faith and a belief that alcohol destroyed families. She decided to campaign to close down saloons or "joints" that operated in spite of state law forbidding their existence. At home in Medicine Lodge she tried to work within the law in closing the saloons. Eventually she came to believe stronger measures were needed, and on June 6, 1900, Nation traveled alone to Kiowa and destroyed several joints by smashing what she could with her cane, stones, and bricks.

On December 27, 1900, Nation struck again, this time smashing the elaborate bar in the Hotel Carey (now the Eaton Hotel) in Wichita. With fellow prohibitionists joining her, Wichita was treated to further raids on saloons in the following weeks. While in that city, she took up the tool that was forever linked to her--the hatchet. After accepting an invitation to go to Enterprise to close another saloon, Nation turned her attention to the capital city-- Topeka.

As the state capital, Topeka offered Nation an appropriate stage for her campaign. The Kansas Legislature had just come into session. Several saloons were illegally operating in the city--including the Senate Saloon, often patronized by legislators. In addition, the Kansas State Temperance Union was gathering in Topeka for its annual state convention. This assured a gathering that was somewhat sympathetic to Nation's cause, if not necessarily her actions.

Nation's train arrived just past 6:30 p.m. on January 26, 1901, in Topeka . The gathering crowd quickly recognized her--with full-length black dress, white ribbon bow at her neck (a temperance symbol), black cotton stockings, square-toed shoes, fringed gray shawl, and black poke bonnet. Many gathered hoping they might see the famous Carry Nation in action smashing a joint. She was led to several saloons where she warned the owners to close their "murder shops." No "hatchetations," as the smashings had come to be known, took place, but one incident did occur. The wife of a joint-keeper hit Nation on the side of the head with a broom, knocking her bonnet off. It was reported that as Nation bent over to pick up the bonnet, the jointist's wife "smote her upon that portion of the anatomy which chanced to be uppermost."

Nation's Topeka visit drew criticism from the media. One reporter from upstate New York called her, "Short and dumpy of figure, rather than tall and commanding; nervous and flighty of manner rather than calm and impressing . . ." Emporia's William Allen White had similar negative comments about Nation.

Two days later Nation met with Governor William Stanley, at his state house office. The meeting did not go well. She pled her case for an enforcement of the laws of the state, but Stanley could give her no assurances and would refer her only to the attorney general. Unhappy with Stanley's seeming inaction, at one point Carry pointed to a black eye she had received at Enterprise days before and said, "Governor, you gave me that black eye." After listening to her statements, a rattled Governor Stanley told her, "You are a woman, but a woman must know a woman's place. They can't come in here and raise this kind of disturbance."

On January 31, 1901, Nation, with a large group of supporters, marched to lower Kansas Avenue to visit the saloons and talk with the owners. Tipped off that she was coming, the jointists threw up barricades in front of their businesses. Upon arriving and seeing the barricades with the jointists peering out from behind them, Nation laughed and called to the men, "Aren't you going to let your mother in, boys? She wants to talk with you."

What followed was extraordinary. Nation spoke gently to the jointists, and gradually they came out from behind the barricades to hear what she had to say. She urged them to close their joints, and made it clear through calm and polite words that she was determined to see them closed. But there were no hatchetations that day. She wanted the jointists to consider what alcohol did to families, and hoped they would close their businesses and abide by the law.

Almost another week passed before Nation and her "Home Defenders," as her supporters came to be known, smashed their first Topeka joint, the Senate Saloon. More quickly followed and Nation was arrested.

In late July 1901, Governor Stanley received a letter from Nation who was in the Topeka jail, containing the following request: "I have some important appointments to fill will you paroll me out after August 5th." It was signed "Carrie Nation a Home Defender." A letter and a list of speaking engagements from her business manager pointing out that the income from these appearances was critical to support her newspaper the Smasher's Mail and to her employees accompanied it. Nation had been convicted for malicious destruction of property in a raid on a saloon and sentenced to 20 days in jail, a fine of $100, and $48.30 in costs. Governor Stanley responded to her appeal by commuting the sentence to end July 30, 1901.

Citizens in other Kansas towns took up the cause and moved to close down the joints, using Carry Nation as their inspiration. Nation herself would spend the remaining 10 years of her life traveling around the country, Canada, and the British Isles for the cause of prohibition. She would also campaign against smoking and gambling, for the cause of woman's suffrage, and matters of women's health, hoping her efforts would "Carry A. Nation." She did not live to see prohibition become law in the United States in 1919, but by her own chosen epitaph, "she hath done what she could."